Despite the high prevalence of prostate cancer in older men, the predictive value of a polygenic risk score (PRS) remains uncertain in men aged ≥70 years. We used a 6.6 million-variant PRS to predict the risk of incident prostate cancer in a prospective study of 5701 men of European descent aged ≥70 years (mean age 75 years) enrolled in the ASPirin in Reducing Events in the Elderly (ASPREE) clinical trial. The study endpoint was prostate cancer, including metastatic or non-metastatic disease, confirmed by an expert panel. After excluding participants with a history of prostate cancer at enrolment, we used a multivariable Cox proportional hazards model to assess the association between the PRS and incident prostate cancer risk, adjusting for covariates. Additionally, we examined the distribution of Gleason grade groups by PRS group to determine if a higher PRS was associated with higher grade disease. We tested for interaction between the PRS and aspirin treatment. Logistic regression was used to independently assess the association of the PRS with prevalent (pre-trial) prostate cancer, reported in medical histories. During a median follow-up time of 4.6 years, 218 of the 5701 participants (3.8%) were diagnosed with prostate cancer. The PRS predicted incident risk with a hazard ratio (HR) of 1.52 per standard deviation (SD) (95% confidence interval (CI) 1.33-1.74, p < 0.001). Men in the top quintile of the PRS distribution had an almost three times higher risk of prostate cancer than men in the lowest quintile (HR = 2.99 (95% CI 1.90-4.27), p < 0.001). However, a higher PRS was not associated with a higher Gleason grade groups. We found no interaction between aspirin treatment and the PRS for prostate cancer risk. The PRS was also associated with prevalent prostate cancer (odds ratio = 1.80 per SD (95% CI 1.65-1.96), p < 0.001).While a PRS for prostate cancer is strongly associated with incident risk in men aged ≥70 years, the clinical utility of the PRS as a biomarker is currently limited by its inability to select for clinically significant disease.
Cancers. 2021 Nov 19*** epublish ***
Andrew Bakshi, Moeen Riaz, Suzanne G Orchard, Prudence R Carr, Amit D Joshi, Yin Cao, Richard Rebello, Tú Nguyen-Dumont, Melissa C Southey, Jeremy L Millar, Lucy Gately, Peter Gibbs, Leslie G Ford, Howard L Parnes, Andrew T Chan, John J McNeil, Paul Lacaze
Department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine, School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, Monash University, Melbourne, VIC 3004, Australia., Clinical and Translational Epidemiology Unit, MGH Cancer Center, Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02108, USA., Alvin J. Siteman Cancer Center, Division of Public Health Sciences, Department of Surgery, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO 63110, USA., Centre for Cancer Research, Department of Clinical Pathology, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, VIC 3010, Australia., Precision Medicine, School of Clinical Sciences at Monash Health, Monash University, Melbourne, VIC 3168, Australia., Personalised Oncology Division, Walter and Eliza Hall Institute Medical Research, Faculty of Medicine, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, VIC 3052, Australia., Division of Cancer Prevention, National Cancer Institute, Rockville, MD 20892, USA.