Hidetaka Kawamura, Tomotaka Ugai, Yasutoshi Takashima, Kazuo Okadome, Takashi Shimizu, Kosuke Mima, Naohiko Akimoto, Koichiro Haruki, Kota Arima, Melissa Zhao, Juha P Väyrynen, Kana Wu, Xuehong Zhang, Kimmie Ng, Jonathan A Nowak, Jeffrey A Meyerhardt, Edward L Giovannucci, Marios Giannakis, Andrew T Chan, Curtis Huttenhower, Wendy S Garrett, Mingyang Song, Shuji Ogino
OBJECTIVE: To test hypotheses that appendectomy history might lower long-term colorectal cancer risk and that the risk reduction might be strong for tumors enriched with Fusobacterium nucleatum, bacterial species implicated in colorectal carcinogenesis. BACKGROUND: The absence of the appendix, an immune system organ and a possible reservoir of certain pathogenic microbes, may affect the intestinal microbiome, thereby altering long-term colorectal cancer risk. METHODS: Utilizing databases of prospective cohort studies, namely the Nurses' Health Study and the Health Professionals Follow-up Study, we examined the association of appendectomy history with colorectal cancer incidence overall and subclassified by the amount of tumor tissue Fusobacterium nucleatum (Fusobacterium animalis)...
May 6, 2024: Annals of Surgery