Association of CD14 variant with prostate cancer in African American men

BACKGROUND African American men have the highest rates of prostate cancer worldwide, and immunogenetic studies suggest that people of African descent have increased susceptibility to diseases of inflammation. Since genetic susceptibility is an etiological factor in prostate cancer, we hypothesize that sequence variants in the promoter region of the CD14 gene that regulate inflammation may modify individual susceptibility to this disease. METHODS The CD14 promoter was screened for single‐nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) using dHPLC. One variant, −260 C>T (rs2569190), was genotyped via restriction digest in all study participants (264 cases and 188 controls). The association of disease status and the polymorphism was analyzed by unconditional logistic regression. Odds ratios with 95% confidence intervals were calculated, stratifying by ethnicity and adjusting for age. Two‐sided P‐values of ≤0.05 were considered as statistically significant. RESULTS Eleven variants (four novel) were identified in the promoter region of CD14. A marginal association between the C genotypes (C/C + C/T) and prostate cancer was found (P = 0.07). When stratified by age, among men ≥55 years of age, the C genotypes were significantly associated with prostate cancer (P