Is there an association between blood group and survival in pancreatic cancer?

An association between the ABO groups and pancreatic cancer has been shown previously, group A being significantly commoner in affected patients. We conducted the present study to investigate the prognostic effect of ABO blood group on overall survival of pancreas cancer patients.

Patients who were diagnosed between 2005 and 2010 with pancreas cancer at Ankara Numune Education and Research Hospital were analyzed retrospectively. Patient demographics and ABO blood groups were obtained from medical charts.

Fifty pancreas cancer patients with known ABO blood group were included, 26 (52%) group A, 12 patients (24%) group 0, 9 (18%) group B, and 3 (6%) group AB. Blood group A pancreas cancer patient median age was 61.5 (39-80) years, with the median age of the other blood groups (B, AB,O) being 55.5 (32-74) years (p=0.14). 18% of patients with blood group A and11%of the other blood group patients had metastasis (p=0.17) at the time of diagnosis. The median overall survival of blood group A pancreas patients was significantly lower than the other blood group patients, 7.6 (95%CI: 5.0-10.2) months versus 29.0 (95%CI: 0.0-68.8) months (p=0.05).

Acccording to previously published cohort studies a relation may exist between ABO blood groups and cancer of pancreas. In this study we observed that pancreas cancer patients with blood group A have significantly worse overall survival than other blood groups.