Single nucleotide variants in metastasis‐related genes are associated with breast cancer risk, by lymph node involvement and estrogen receptor status, in women with European and African ancestry

Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in pathways influencing lymph node (LN) metastasis and estrogen receptor (ER) status in breast cancer may partially explain inter‐patient variability in prognosis. We examined 154 SNPs in 12 metastasis‐related genes for associations with breast cancer risk, stratified by LN and ER status, in European‐American (EA) and African‐American (AA) women. Two‐thousand six hundred and seventy‐one women enrolled in the Women's Circle of Health Study were genotyped. Pathway analyses were conducted using the adaptive rank truncated product (ARTP) method, with pARTP ≤ 0.10 as significant. Multi‐allelic risk scores were created for the ARTP‐significant gene(s). Single‐SNP and risk score associations were modeled using logistic regression, with false discovery rate (FDR) P‐value adjustment. Although single‐SNP associations were not significant at pFDR