Inflammatory potential of diet and risk for hepatocellular cancer in a case-control study from Italy

摘要

Inflammation and diet have been suggested to be important risk factors for hepatocellular cancer (HCC). This Italian multicentre hospital-based case-control study conducted between 1999 and 2002 and including 185 cases with incident, histologically confirmed HCC, and 404 controls hospitalised for acute non-neoplastic diseases provided an opportunity to investigate the association between HCC and the dietary inflammatory index (DII). The DII was computed on the basis of dietary intake assessed 2 years before the date of interview by a validated sixty-three-item FFQ. Logistic regression models were used to estimate OR adjusted for age, sex, study centre, education, BMI, smoking, physical activity, serum markers of hepatitis B and C infection and energy intake. Energy adjustment for DII was performed using the residual method. Participants in the highest tertile of DII scores (i.e. with a more pro-inflammatory diet) had a higher risk for HCC (ORtertile 3 v, 1 2.43; 95 % CI 1.27, 4.68; P-trend = 0.03). When stratified by the presence or absence of hepatitis B/C infection and sex, DII was strongly associated with HCC in hepatitis B- and C-negative participants (ORtertile 3 v. 1 4.18; 95 % CI 1.53, 11.39; P-trend = 0.02) and among males (ORtertile 3 v. 1 3.60; 95 % CI 1.65, 7.87; P-trend = 0.001). These results indicate that a pro-inflammatory diet is associated with increased risk for HCC, in those without a history of hepatitis B/C infection and among males.