Publications by authors named "MacInnis R"

Background: The 313-variant polygenic risk score (PRS) provides a promising tool for clinical breast cancer risk prediction. However, evaluation of the PRS across different European populations which could influence risk estimation has not been performed.

Methods: We explored the distribution of PRS across European populations using genotype data from 94,072 females without breast cancer diagnosis, of European-ancestry from 21 countries participating in the Breast Cancer Association Consortium (BCAC) and 223,316 females without breast cancer diagnosis from the UK Biobank.

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Menopausal users of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) are at increased breast cancer risk and decreased colorectal cancer (CRC) risk compared with individuals who have never used HRT, but these opposing associations may differ by familial risk of breast cancer and CRC. We harmonized data from 3 cohorts and generated separate breast cancer and CRC familial risk scores based on cancer family history. We defined moderate or strong family history as a risk score of 0.

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Genetic variation at the 19q13.3 KLK locus is linked with prostate cancer susceptibility in men. The non-synonymous KLK3 single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP), rs17632542 (c.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study investigates the relationship between recreational physical activity (RPA) in adolescence and early adulthood and breast cancer (BC) risk in women under 40 years old, using data from a large international family cohort.
  • Results indicate that higher levels of RPA are linked to reduced BC risk, with a 12% lower risk during adolescence and a 16% lower risk during early adulthood for women in the highest activity quartiles.
  • The findings suggest that encouraging more physical activity in young women could be a crucial strategy for lowering the increasing incidence of breast cancer in this age group.
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Importance: Few studies have investigated whether the associations between pregnancy-related factors and breast cancer (BC) risk differ by underlying BC susceptibility. Evidence regarding variation in BC risk is critical to understanding BC causes and for developing effective risk-based screening guidelines.

Objective: To examine the association between pregnancy-related factors and BC risk, including modification by a of BC where scores are based on age and BC family history.

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Single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) interactions are the key to improving polygenic risk scores. Previous studies reported several significant SNP-SNP interaction pairs that shared a common SNP to form a cluster, but some identified pairs might be false positives. This study aims to identify factors associated with the cluster effect of false positivity and develop strategies to enhance the accuracy of SNP-SNP interactions.

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Mammographic textures show promise as breast cancer risk predictors, distinct from mammographic density. Yet, there is a lack of comprehensive evidence to determine the relative strengths as risk predictor of textures and density and the reliability of texture-based measures. We searched the PubMed database for research published up to November 2023, which assessed breast cancer risk associations [odds ratios (OR)] with texture-based measures and percent mammographic density (PMD), and their discrimination [area under the receiver operating characteristics curve (AUC)], using same datasets.

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Young breast and bowel cancers (e.g., those diagnosed before age 40 or 50 years) have far greater morbidity and mortality in terms of years of life lost, and are increasing in incidence, but have been less studied.

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Article Synopsis
  • A polygenic risk score (PRS) evaluates the impact of multiple genetic variants on disease risk but may reflect familial confounding rather than direct causation.
  • New methods, ICE FALCON and ICE CRISTAL, analyze family data to determine the causal relationship of PRSs with breast cancer, showing differing results based on the age of diagnosis.
  • Findings indicate no causal link for younger patients (<50 years), while older patients exhibit evidence of causation, suggesting that genetic variants may not directly cause breast cancer but can be related to other familial or nongenetic factors.
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The 313-variant polygenic risk score (PRS) provides a promising tool for breast cancer risk prediction. However, evaluation of the PRS across different European populations which could influence risk estimation has not been performed. Here, we explored the distribution of PRS across European populations using genotype data from 94,072 females without breast cancer, of European-ancestry from 21 countries participating in the Breast Cancer Association Consortium (BCAC) and 225,105 female participants from the UK Biobank.

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Background: Cirrus is an automated risk predictor for breast cancer that comprises texture-based mammographic features and is mostly independent of mammographic density. We investigated genetic and environmental variance of variation in Cirrus.

Methods: We measured Cirrus for 3,195 breast cancer-free participants, including 527 pairs of monozygotic (MZ) twins, 271 pairs of dizygotic (DZ) twins, and 1,599 siblings of twins.

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  • A recent study analyzed genetic data from over 156,000 prostate cancer cases and 788,000 controls from diverse populations, significantly increasing the representation of non-European participants.
  • Researchers identified 187 new genetic risk variants for prostate cancer, bringing the total to 451, enhancing understanding of genetic factors across different ancestries.
  • The developed genetic risk score (GRS) showed varying risk levels for prostate cancer among different ancestry groups, highlighting its potential for better risk assessment, especially in men of African descent.
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  • - The study investigated how following the 2018 cancer prevention recommendations from the WCRF/AICR affects cancer risk in a group of 20,001 participants aged 40-69 over an average of 16 years.
  • - Results showed that those most adhering to healthy lifestyle recommendations had a significantly lower risk of overall cancer and specific types like breast and prostate cancer, with smoking and alcohol intake being key factors.
  • - The findings suggest that improving lifestyle habits could greatly reduce cancer risk, highlighting that less than 0.2% of participants fully adhered to the recommendations, indicating substantial room for improvement.
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Background: Mammogram risk scores based on texture and density defined by different brightness thresholds are associated with breast cancer risk differently and could reveal distinct information about breast cancer risk. We aimed to investigate causal relationships between these intercorrelated mammogram risk scores to determine their relevance to breast cancer aetiology.

Methods: We used digitised mammograms for 371 monozygotic twin pairs, aged 40-70 years without a prior diagnosis of breast cancer at the time of mammography, from the Australian Mammographic Density Twins and Sisters Study.

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Importance: Germline gene panel testing is recommended for men with advanced prostate cancer (PCa) or a family history of cancer. While evidence is limited for some genes currently included in panel testing, gene panels are also likely to be incomplete and missing genes that influence PCa risk and aggressive disease.

Objective: To identify genes associated with aggressive PCa.

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Background: While remaining incurable, median overall survival for MM now exceeds 5 years. Yet few studies have investigated how modifiable lifestyle factors influence survival. We investigate whether adiposity, diet, alcohol, or smoking are associated with MM-related fatality.

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Background: Studies of women of European ancestry have shown that the average familial relative risk for first-degree relatives of women with breast cancer is approximately twofold, but little is known for Asian women. We aimed to provide evidence for the association between family history and breast cancer risk for Asian women by systematically reviewing published literature.

Methods: Studies reporting the familial relative risk of breast cancer for Asian women were searched in three online databases and complemented by a manual search.

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Enhanced survival following a diagnosis of cancer has led to a steep rise in the number of individuals diagnosed with a second primary cancer. We examined the association between pre-cancer cigarette smoking and risk of second cancer in 9785 participants diagnosed with first invasive cancer after enrolment in the Melbourne Collaborative Cohort Study. Follow-up was from date of first invasive cancer until diagnosis of second primary invasive cancer, death, or 31 July 2019, whichever came first.

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  • DEPTH (DEPendency of association on the number of Top Hits) is a method used to find candidate susceptibility regions linked to colorectal cancer by analyzing sequences of variants in the genome from large datasets.
  • In a study combining data from two major colorectal cancer research groups, DEPTH identified a significant number of candidate regions (569 in common between studies), and many of these were not detected using traditional genome-wide association study (GWAS) approaches.
  • The findings suggest that DEPTH could serve as a valuable tool alongside conventional GWAS for discovering new susceptibility regions, potentially improving understanding of genetic risks for colorectal cancer.
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  • The text discusses how known and unknown factors contribute to differences in disease risk among individuals of the same age, particularly focusing on familial aspects of risk, both genetic and non-genetic.
  • A new model called VALID is introduced, which helps quantify the variance in risk by analyzing correlations between family members and transforming familial risk ratios into components of risk.
  • The application of VALID in female breast cancer demonstrates that, despite identifying significant genetic risk factors, there remains a considerable gap in understanding genetic and familial influences, especially in younger women.
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Genome-wide polygenic risk scores (GW-PRSs) have been reported to have better predictive ability than PRSs based on genome-wide significance thresholds across numerous traits. We compared the predictive ability of several GW-PRS approaches to a recently developed PRS of 269 established prostate cancer-risk variants from multi-ancestry GWASs and fine-mapping studies (PRS). GW-PRS models were trained with a large and diverse prostate cancer GWAS of 107,247 cases and 127,006 controls that we previously used to develop the multi-ancestry PRS.

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Article Synopsis
  • Genome-wide polygenic risk scores (GW-PRS) were analyzed for their predictive ability regarding prostate cancer risk, compared to an established multi-ancestry polygenic risk score (PRS).
  • The GW-PRS models utilized data from a large and diverse group of nearly 235,000 participants, including individuals from both African and European ancestries.
  • Results showed that while GW-PRS had varying predictive abilities, the multi-ancestry PRS performed equally well or better in predicting prostate cancer risk for both ancestry groups, indicating GW-PRS may not offer significant improvements in risk prediction.
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DNA methylation marks that are inherited from parents to offspring are known to play a role in cancer risk and could explain part of the familial risk for cancer. We therefore conducted a genome-wide search for heritable methylation marks associated with prostate cancer risk. Peripheral blood DNA methylation was measured for 133 of the 469 members of 25 multiple-case prostate cancer families, using the EPIC array.

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Background: We quantified the individual and joint contribution of contemporaneous causal behavioural exposures on the future burden of oesophageal and stomach cancers and their subtypes and assessed whether these burdens differ between population groups in Australia, as such estimates are currently lacking.

Methods: We combined hazard ratios from seven pooled Australian cohorts (N = 367,058) linked to national cancer and death registries with exposure prevalence from the 2017-2018 National Health Survey to estimate Population Attributable Fractions (PAFs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs), accounting for competing risk of death.

Results: Current and past smoking explain 35.

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  • Glioma is a major form of malignant brain cancer, with glioblastoma being particularly deadly, so researchers conducted a genetic study in Australia to explore risk factors by subtype and sex.
  • They analyzed genetic data for over 560 glioma cases and 2,237 controls, focusing on specific genetic variations (SNPs) linked to glioma risk, using logistic regression for their analysis.
  • The study confirmed earlier findings about certain genetic regions related to glioma risk, particularly emphasizing a stronger risk association in females for the 8q24.21 region, suggesting that understanding sex differences could improve prevention and treatment strategies.
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