Anthropometry and prostate cancer risk: a prospective study of 22,248 Norwegian men

Objectives: Few risk factors for prostate cancer are known, but both endocrine changes and dietary factors have been implicated in the etiology of the disease. Anthropometry may therefore provide a tool in the search for carcinogenic mechanisms connected to these suggested causal components. Methods: We have studied the association between body size and prostate cancer risk in a prospective study of 22,248 Norwegian men. During 12 years of follow-up, 642 men developed cancer of the prostate. A possible association between anthropometry (height, weight, body mass index (BMI), and lean body mass (LBM)) and prostate cancer risk was assessed using Cox regression analysis. Results: Overall, we observed no significant trend for any of the variables studied, although an excess risk of prostate cancer with increasing height was suggested by an age-adjusted relative risk of 1.2 (95% CI=0.9-1.6) for the tallest compared to the shortest quintile of men. None of the other three variables (weight, BMI, and LBM) displayed any consistent relation with the risk of prostate cancer. Conclusions: We conclude that these results do not indicate a strong association between anthropometric factors and risk of prostate cancer.