Association among lifestyle, clinical examination, polymorphisms in CDH1 gene and Traditional Chinese Medicine syndrome differentiation of gastric cancer

OBJECTIVE: To explore the association among lifestyle, clinical examination, polymorphisms in CDH1 gene and Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) syndrome differentiation of gastric cancer (GC). METHODS: A hospital-based population of 387 GC patients was investigated in Jiangsu province. Relevant information regarding lifestyle and clinical examination were collected by a standard questionnaire. Four known single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in CDH1 were investigated by polymerase chain reaction-ligation detection reaction methods. Statistical analysis was conducted by SPSS 16.0 software. RESULTS: The results showed that meal duration and the status of glutamic pyruvic transaminase were significantly associated with TCM syndrome differentiation of GC (both P<0.05). None of the four SNPs in the E-cadherin (CDH1) gene achieved significant differences in their distributions among the nine syndrome types of GC (both P>0.05). However, significant differences were observed in rs13689 genotype distributions between several pairs of syndrome types of GC, suggesting that rs13689 is correlated with the syndrome differentiation of GC. CONCLUSION: Integrated analysis of lifestyle, clinical examination and CDH1 gene polymorphisms can contribute to a better understanding of the GC syndrome types and may improve the efficacy of interventions by stratifying disease according to TCM criteria. (C) 2013 JTCM. All rights reserved.