Abstract
Background
Appetite loss has a major impact on cancer patients. It is exceedingly prevalent, is a prognostic indicator and is associated with inferior quality of life. Cachexia is a multi-factorial syndrome defined by a negative protein and energy balance, driven by a variable combination of reduced food intake and abnormal metabolism. Not all cancer patients that experience weight loss have appetite loss, and the pathophysiology between cachexia and appetite loss may thus be different. Knowledge of pathophysiology of appetite loss in cancer patients is still limited. The primary object of this study was to explore the association with 93 predefined candidate single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and appetite loss in cancer patients to possibly generate new theories of the pathophysiology of the condition.
Methods
A total of 1,853 cancer patients were phenotyped according to appetite loss and then genotyped.
Results
After allowing for multiple testing, there was no statistically significant
association between any of the SNPs analysed and appetite loss. The ten most significant SNPs in the co-dominant model had observed odds ratios varying
from 0.72 to 1.28.
Conclusions
This large exploratory study could not find any associations with loss of appetite and 93 SNPs with a potential to be involved in appetite loss in cancer patients.
This does not however rule out genes putative role in the development of the symptom, but the observed odds ratios are close to one which makes it unlikely that any of the individual SNPs explored in the present study have great
importance.
Appetite loss has a major impact on cancer patients. It is exceedingly prevalent, is a prognostic indicator and is associated with inferior quality of life. Cachexia is a multi-factorial syndrome defined by a negative protein and energy balance, driven by a variable combination of reduced food intake and abnormal metabolism. Not all cancer patients that experience weight loss have appetite loss, and the pathophysiology between cachexia and appetite loss may thus be different. Knowledge of pathophysiology of appetite loss in cancer patients is still limited. The primary object of this study was to explore the association with 93 predefined candidate single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and appetite loss in cancer patients to possibly generate new theories of the pathophysiology of the condition.
Methods
A total of 1,853 cancer patients were phenotyped according to appetite loss and then genotyped.
Results
After allowing for multiple testing, there was no statistically significant
association between any of the SNPs analysed and appetite loss. The ten most significant SNPs in the co-dominant model had observed odds ratios varying
from 0.72 to 1.28.
Conclusions
This large exploratory study could not find any associations with loss of appetite and 93 SNPs with a potential to be involved in appetite loss in cancer patients.
This does not however rule out genes putative role in the development of the symptom, but the observed odds ratios are close to one which makes it unlikely that any of the individual SNPs explored in the present study have great
importance.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 191-198 |
| Number of pages | 8 |
| Journal | Journal of Cachexia, Sarcopenia and Muscle |
| Volume | 3 |
| Issue number | 3 |
| Early online date | 26 Apr 2012 |
| DOIs |
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| Publication status | Published - Sep 2012 |
Keywords
- Anorexia
- Appetite loss
- Cachexia
- Cancer
- SNP
- Genetic
Access to Document
- Is there a genetic cause of appetite loss
© 2012 The Authors. Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of the Society on Sarcopenia, Cachexia and Wasting Disorders This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution‐NonCommercial License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited and is not used for commercial purposes. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/