Region 2 of 8q24 is associated with the risk of aggressive prostate cancer in Caribbean men of African descent from Guadeloupe (French West Indies)

Multiple regions of the genome have been associated with the risk of prostate cancer in Caucasians, particularly including several polymorphisms located at 8q24. Region 2 of 8q24 has been repeatedly found to be associated with the risk of prostate cancer among men of African descent, although one study performed in the Caribbean island of Jamaica did not report this finding. In this study, the single nucleotide polymorphism rs16901979, located in region 2 of 8q24, was genotyped in 498 cases of histologically confirmed prostate cancer and 541 controls from the French Caribbean islands of Guadeloupe, where the population is largely of African descent. The AA genotype and the A allele at rs16901979 were associated with elevated risks of prostate cancer (odds ratios [ORs] = 1.84, 95% confidence interval [95% CI] = 1.26–2.69, P = 0.002 and OR = 1.36, 95% CI = 1.13–1.64, P = 0.001, respectively). Following stratification of the patients by disease aggressiveness, as defined by the Gleason score, the pooled genotypes AC + AA were associated with a higher risk of a Gleason score ≥7 at diagnosis (OR = 1.79, 95% CI = 1.17–2.73, P = 0.007). In summary, the A allele at rs16901979 was associated with the risk of prostate cancer in the Caribbean population of Guadeloupe, confirming its involvement in populations of African descent. Moreover, our study provides the first evidence of an association between this variant and the risk of aggressive prostate cancer.