EBPH is Back for a Global Audience

We are proud to announce the re-starting of the Journal Epidemiology Biostatistics and Public Health (EBPH), made possible thanks to the Milano University Press (MUP), the new publisher of the journal

Silver-based catalytic materials for the simultaneous removal of soot and NOx

The potential of silver-based catalysts in the simultaneous removal of particulate matter (soot) and NOxis investigated in this work and compared with that of a model Pt-Ba/Al2O3catalyst. The Ag (5 wt%) - Ba (10 wt%)/MO (MO = CeO2, ZrO2, Al2O3) and Ag (5 wt%) - Sr (10 wt%)/CeO2catalysts have been prepared by incipient wetness impregnation and characterized by BET, XRD, HRTEM, XPS and temperature-programmed reduction (TPR) experiments. The behavior of the catalyst in the soot combustion (under loose conditions) and NOxremoval has been separately analyzed by means of temperature programmed oxidation (TPO) and isothermal concentration step change (ICSC) experiments, respectively. The results show that all the catalysts are active in soot combustion with a significant decrease of oxidation onset temperature compared to uncatalyzed soot oxidation. The removal of NOxin the absence and in the presence of soot was investigated under cycling conditions, i.e. alternating lean-rich phases according to the LNT strategy. It has been found that the Ag-based samples are able to simultaneously remove soot and NOx. In particular, comparing the behavior of the prepared catalysts, the Ba-containing systems showed higher NOxstorage capacity than Sr-catalyst; also, the nitrogen selectivity increased even if resulted lower than the traditional LNT Pt-based catalyst. A detrimental effect of soot on the NOxstorage activity has been also observed.Postprint (author's final draft

Garlic consumption in relation to colorectal cancer risk and to alterations of blood bacterial DNA

PURPOSE: Garlic consumption has been inversely associated to intestinal adenoma (IA) and colorectal cancer (CRC) risk, although evidence is not consistent. Gut microbiota has been implied in CRC pathogenesis and is also influenced by garlic consumption. We analyzed whether dietary garlic influence CRC risk and bacterial DNA in blood. METHODS: We conducted a case-control study in Italy involving 100 incident CRC cases, 100 IA and 100 healthy controls matched by center, sex and age. We used a validated food frequency questionnaire to assess dietary habits and garlic consumption. Blood bacterial DNA profile was estimated using qPCR and16S rRNA gene profiling. We derived odds ratios (ORs) and the corresponding 95% confidence intervals (CIs) of IA and CRC according to garlic consumption from multiple conditional logistic regression. We used Mann-Whitney and chi-square tests to evaluate taxa differences in abundance and prevalence. RESULTS: The OR of CRC for medium/high versus low/null garlic consumption was 0.27 (95% CI = 0.11-0.66). Differences in garlic consumption were found for selected blood bacterial taxa. Medium/high garlic consumption was associated to an increase of Corynebacteriales order, Nocardiaceae family and Rhodococcus genus, and to a decrease of Family XI and Finegoldia genus. CONCLUSIONS: The study adds data on the protective effect of dietary garlic on CRC risk. Moreover, it supports evidence of a translocation of bacterial material to bloodstream and corroborates the hypothesis of a diet-microbiota axis as a mechanism behind the role of garlic in CRC prevention

Inverse Association between Dietary Iron Intake and Gastric Cancer: A Pooled Analysis of Case-Control Studies of the Stop Consortium

Background: Inconsistent findings have been reported regarding the relationship between dietary iron intake and the risk of gastric cancer (GC). Methods: We pooled data from 11 case-control studies from the Stomach Cancer Pooling (StoP) Project. Total dietary iron intake was derived from food frequency questionnaires combined with national nutritional tables. We derived the odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for quartiles of dietary iron through multivariable unconditional logistic regression models. Secondary analyses stratified by sex, smoking status, caloric intake, anatomical subsite and histological type were performed. Results: Among 4658 cases and 12247 controls, dietary iron intake was inversely associated with GC (per quartile OR 0.88; 95% CI: 0.83-0.93). Results were similar between cardia (OR = 0.85, 95% CI = 0.77-0.94) and non-cardia GC (OR = 0.87, 95% CI = 0.81-0.94), and for diffuse (OR = 0.79, 95% CI = 0.69-0.89) and intestinal type (OR = 0.88, 95% CI = 0.79-0.98). Iron intake exerted an independent effect from that of smoking and salt intake. Additional adjustment by meat and fruit/vegetable intake did not alter the results. Conclusions: Dietary iron is inversely related to GC, with no difference by subsite or histological type. While the results should be interpreted with caution, they provide evidence against a direct effect of iron in gastric carcinogenesis

Family History and Gastric Cancer Risk: A Pooled Investigation in the Stomach Cancer Pooling (STOP) Project Consortium

Although there is a clear relationship between family history (FH) and the risk of gastric cancer (GC), quantification is still needed in relation to different histological types and anatomical sites, and in strata of covariates. The objective was to analyze the risk of GC according to first-degree FH in a uniquely large epidemiological consortium of GC. This investigation includes 5946 cases and 12,776 controls from 17 studies of the Stomach Cancer Pooling (StoP) Project consortium. Summary odds ratios (OR) and the corresponding 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were calculated by pooling study-specific ORs using fixed-effect model meta-analysis techniques. Stratified analyses were carried out by sex, age, tumor location and histological type, smoking habit, socioeconomic status, alcohol intake and fruit consumption. The pooled OR for GC was 1.84 (95% CI: 1.64-2.04; I2 = 6.1%, P heterogeneity = 0.383) in subjects with vs. those without first-degree relatives with GC. No significant differences were observed among subgroups of sex, age, geographic area or study period. Associations tended to be stronger for non-cardia (OR = 1.82; 95% CI: 1.59-2.05 for subjects with FH) than for cardia GC (OR = 1.38; 95% CI: 0.98-1.77), and for the intestinal (OR = 1.92; 95% CI: 1.62-2.23) than for the diffuse histotype (OR = 1.62; 95% CI: 1.28-1.96). This analysis confirms the effect of FH on the risk of GC, reporting an approximately doubled risk, and provides further quantification of the risk of GC according to the subsite and histotype. Considering these findings, accounting for the presence of FH to carry out correct prevention and diagnosis measures is of the utmost importance

The Association between Peptic Ulcer Disease and Gastric Cancer: Results from the Stomach Cancer Pooling (StoP) Project Consortium

Simple Summary Gastric cancer (GC) is the fifth most common type of cancer and the fourth most common cause of cancer-related mortality. In this meta-analysis, we utilized SToP consortium data to investigate the association between gastric ulcer (GU) and duodenal ulcer (DU) and development of GC. Among 4106 GC cases and 6922 controls, we detected a positive association between GU and GC (OR = 3.04, 95% CI: 2.07-4.49). On the other hand, no significant association between DU and GC was detected (OR = 1.03, 95% CI: 0.77-1.39). In the pooled analysis, incorporating 11 case-control studies revealed positive association between the gastric ulcer and risk of gastric cancer. Background. Gastric cancer (GC) is the fifth most common type of cancer and the fourth most common cause of cancer-related mortality. Although the risk of GC and peptic ulcer disease (PUD) is known to be increased by H. pylori infection, evidence regarding the direct relationship between PUD and GC across ethnicities is inconclusive. Therefore, we investigated the association between PUD and GC in the Stomach cancer Pooling (StoP) consortium. Methods. History of peptic ulcer disease was collected using a structured questionnaire in 11 studies in the StoP consortium, including 4106 GC cases and 6922 controls. The two-stage individual-participant data meta-analysis approach was adopted to generate a priori. Unconditional logistic regression and Firth's penalized maximum likelihood estimator were used to calculate study-specific odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for the association between gastric ulcer (GU)/duodenal ulcer (DU) and risk of GC. Results. History of GU and DU was thoroughly reported and used in association analysis, respectively, by 487 cases (12.5%) and 276 controls (4.1%), and 253 cases (7.8%) and 318 controls (6.0%). We found that GU was associated with an increased risk of GC (OR = 3.04, 95% CI: 2.07-4.49). No association between DU and GC risk was observed (OR = 1.03, 95% CI: 0.77-1.39). Conclusions. In the pooled analysis of 11 case-control studies in a large consortium (i.e., the Stomach cancer Pooling (StoP) consortium), we found a positive association between GU and risk of GC and no association between DU and GC risk

Tobacco smoking and gastric cancer: meta-analyses of published data versus pooled analyses of individual participant data (StoP Project).

Tobacco smoking is one of the main risk factors for gastric cancer, but the magnitude of the association estimated by conventional systematic reviews and meta-analyses might be inaccurate, due to heterogeneous reporting of data and publication bias. We aimed to quantify the combined impact of publication-related biases, and heterogeneity in data analysis or presentation, in the summary estimates obtained from conventional meta-analyses. We compared results from individual participant data pooled-analyses, including the studies in the Stomach Cancer Pooling (StoP) Project, with conventional meta-analyses carried out using only data available in previously published reports from the same studies. From the 23 studies in the StoP Project, 20 had published reports with information on smoking and gastric cancer, but only six had specific data for gastric cardia cancer and seven had data on the daily number of cigarettes smoked. Compared to the results obtained with the StoP database, conventional meta-analyses overvalued the relation between ever smoking (summary odds ratios ranging from 7% higher for all studies to 22% higher for the risk of gastric cardia cancer) and yielded less precise summary estimates (SE ≤2.4 times higher). Additionally, funnel plot asymmetry and corresponding hypotheses tests were suggestive of publication bias. Conventional meta-analyses and individual participant data pooled-analyses reached similar conclusions on the direction of the association between smoking and gastric cancer. However, published data tended to overestimate the magnitude of the effects, possibly due to publication biases and limited the analyses by different levels of exposure or cancer subtypes

Coffee consumption and gastric cancer: a pooled analysis from the Stomach cancer Pooling Project consortium

Objective: This study aimed to evaluate and quantify the relationship between coffee and gastric cancer using a uniquely large dataset from an international consortium of observational studies on gastric cancer, including data from 18 studies, for a total of 8198 cases and 21 419 controls. Methods: A two-stage approach was used to obtain the pooled odds ratios (ORs) and the corresponding 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for coffee drinkers versus never or rare drinkers. A one-stage logistic mixed-effects model with a random intercept for each study was used to estimate the dose-response relationship. Estimates were adjusted for sex, age and the main recognized risk factors for gastric cancer. Results: Compared to never or rare coffee drinkers, the estimated pooled OR for coffee drinkers was 1.03 (95% CI, 0.94-1.13). When the amount of coffee intake was considered, the pooled ORs were 0.91 (95% CI, 0.81-1.03) for drinkers of 1-2 cups per day, 0.95 (95% CI, 0.82-1.10) for 3-4 cups, and 0.95 (95% CI, 0.79-1.15) for five or more cups. An OR of 1.20 (95% CI, 0.91-1.58) was found for heavy coffee drinkers (seven or more cups of caffeinated coffee per day). A positive association emerged for high coffee intake (five or more cups per day) for gastric cardia cancer only. Conclusions: These findings better quantify the previously available evidence of the absence of a relevant association between coffee consumption and gastric cancer

The association between diabetes and gastric cancer

Background: Prior epidemiologic studies on the association between diabetes and gastric cancer risk provided inconclusive findings, while traditional, aggregate data meta-analyses were characterized by high between-study heterogeneity. Objective: To investigate the association between type 2 diabetes and gastric cancer using data from the 'Stomach Cancer Pooling (StoP) Project', an international consortium of more than 30 case-control and nested case-control studies, which is large and provides harmonized definition of participants' characteristics across individual studies. The data have the potential to minimize between-study heterogeneity and provide greater statistical power for subgroup analysis. Methods: We included 5592 gastric cancer cases and 12 477 controls from 14 studies from Europe, Asia, North America, and South America in a two-stage individual-participant data meta-analysis. Random-effect models were used to estimate summary odds ratios (ORs) and their corresponding 95% confidence intervals (CIs) by pooling study-specific ORs. Results: We did not find an overall association between diabetes and gastric cancer (pooled OR = 1.01, 95% CI, 0.94-1.07). However, the risk of cardia gastric cancer was significantly higher among individuals with type 2 diabetes (OR = 1.16, 95% CI, 1.02-1.33). There was no association between diabetes and gastric cancer risk in strata of Helicobacter pylori infection serostatus, age, sex, BMI, smoking status, alcohol consumption, fruit/vegetable intake, gastric cancer histologic type, and source of controls. Conclusion: This study provides additional evidence that diabetes is unrelated to gastric cancer overall but may be associated with excess cardia gastric cancer risk

Tea consumption and gastric cancer: a pooled analysis from the Stomach cancer Pooling (StoP) Project consortium

Background Evidence from epidemiological studies on the role of tea drinking in gastric cancer risk remains inconsistent. We aimed to investigate and quantify the relationship between tea consumption and gastric cancer in the Stomach cancer Pooling (StoP) Project consortium. Methods A total of 9438 cases and 20,451 controls from 22 studies worldwide were included. Odds ratios (ORs) and the corresponding 95% confidence intervals (CIs) of gastric cancer for regular versus non-regular tea drinkers were estimated by one and two-stage modelling analyses, including terms for sex, age and the main recognised risk factors for gastric cancer. Results Compared to non-regular drinkers, the estimated adjusted pooled OR for regular tea drinkers was 0.91 (95% CI: 0.85-0.97). When the amount of tea consumed was considered, the OR for consumption of 1-2 cups/day was 1.01 (95% CI: 0.94-1.09) and for >3 cups/day was 0.91 (95% CI: 0.80-1.03). Stronger inverse associations emerged among regular drinkers in China and Japan (OR: 0.67, 95% CI: 0.49-0.91) where green tea is consumed, in subjects with H. pylori infection (OR: 0.68, 95% CI: 0.58-0.80), and for gastric cardia cancer (OR: 0.64, 95% CI: 0.49-0.84). Conclusion Our results indicate a weak inverse association between tea consumption and gastric cancer