ABO blood group and breast cancer incidence and survival

ABO blood type has been associated with risk and survival for several malignancies; however, data for an association with breast cancer are inconsistent. Our study population consisted of Nurses' Health Study participants with self-reported serologic blood type and/or ABO genotype. Using Cox proportional hazards regression, we examined the association between serologic blood type and incident breast cancer among 67,697 women, including 3,107 cases. In addition, we examined the association with ABO genotype in a nested case-control study of 1,138 invasive breast cancer cases and 1,090 matched controls. Finally, we evaluated the association between serologic blood type and survival among 2,036 participants with breast cancer. No clear association was seen between serologic blood type or ABO genotype and risk of total breast cancer, invasive breast cancer or breast cancer subtypes. Compared to women with blood type O, the age-adjusted incidence rate ratios for serologic blood type and total breast cancer were 1.06 (95% CI, 0.98-1.15) for type A, 1.06 (95% CI, 0.93-1.22) for AB and 1.08 (95% CI, 0.96-1.20) for B. In genetic analyses, odds ratios for invasive breast cancer were 1.05 (95% CI, 0.87-1.27) for A/O, 1.21 (95% CI, 0.86-1.69) for A/A, 0.84 (95% CI, 0.56-1.26) for A/B, 0.84 (95% CI, 0.63-1.13) for B/O and 1.17 (95% CI, 0.35-3.86) for B/B, compared to O/O. No significant association was noted between blood type and overall or breast cancer-specific mortality. Our results suggest no association between ABO blood group and breast cancer risk or survival.