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Published on: March 10, 2015
Investigation of the causal relationship between Interleukin-6 signaling and gastrointestinal tract cancers: A
Ze Yang1, Lingyun Guo1, Yandi Sun1
1Department of Biochemistry & Cancer Medicine, International Institutes of Medicine, the Fourth Affiliated Hospital of Zhejiang University School of Medicine, Yiwu, Zhejiang, China; Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, School of Medicine, Zhejiang University, 866 Yu Hang Tang Road, Hangzhou, Zhejiang 310058, China.
Background:
Observational studies indicate that interleukin-6(IL-6) has been associated with gastrointestinal tract cancers. However, the causal association is still confusing. Thus, we aimed to putative the causality between IL-6 signaling and gastrointestinal tract cancers.
Methods:
We conducted a two-sample Mendelian randomization analysis to assess the causal effects. Two groups of IL-6 signaling-related single nucleotide polymorphisms were chosen from two Genome-wide association studies. Summary-level data for gastrointestinal tract cancers including esophageal, gastric, and colorectal cancer, were obtained from the FinnGen consortium and UK Biobank study. We also performed survival analysis to explore the prognostic value of IL-6 in gastrointestinal tract cancers.
Results:
Genetically predicted plasma sIL6R level, which inhibits IL-6 Signaling, was associated with a reduced risk of gastric cancer in FinnGen. In the combined analysis of the two sources, genetically predicted sIL6R was associated with a decreased risk of gastric cancer (OR = 0.943, 95%CI: 0.904,0.983, p = 0.006). Survival analysis results indicated the prognostic value of IL-6 in gastric cancer.
Conclusions:
These results present evidence indicating that genetically-determined reduced IL-6 signaling lowers the risk of gastric cancer, which may provide potential prevention and therapeutic strategies for gastric cancer. Additionally, IL-6 may be a prognostic biomarker for gastric cancer.
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