To assist in medical counseling, we present a method to estimate the chance that a woman with given age and risk factors will develop breast cancer over a specified interval. The risk factors used were age at menarche, age at first live birth, number of previous biopsies, and number of first-degree relatives with breast cancer. A model of relative risks for various combinations of these factors was developed from case-control data from the Breast Cancer Detection Demonstration Project (BCDDP). The model allowed for the fact that relative risks associated with previous breast biopsies were smaller for women aged 50 or more than for younger women. Thus, the proportional hazards models for those under age 50 and for those of age 50 or more. The baseline age-specific hazard rate, which is the rate for a patient without identified risk factors, is computed as the product of the observed age-specific composite hazard rate times the quantity 1 minus the attributable risk. We calculated individualized breast cancer probabilities from information on relative risks and the baseline hazard rate. These calculations take competing risks and the interval of risk into account. Our data were derived from women who participated in the BCDDP and who tended to return for periodic examinations. For this reason, the risk projections given are probably most reliable for counseling women who plan to be examined about once a year.

A straightforward and unified approach is presented for the calculation of the population attributable risk per cent (etiologic fraction) in the general multivariate setting, with emphasis on using data from case-control studies. The summary attributable risk for multiple factors can be estimated, with or without adjustment for other (confounding) risk factors. The relation of this approach to procedures in the literature is discussed. Given values of the relative risks for various combinations of factors, all that is required is the distribution of these factors among the cases only. The required information can often be estimated solely from case-control data, and in some situations relative risk estimates from one population can be applied to calculation of attributable risk for another population. The authors emphasize the benefits to be obtained from logistic regression models, so that risks need not be estimated separately in a large number of strata, some of which may contain inadequate numbers of individuals. This approach allows incorporation of important interactions between factors, but does not require that all possible interactions be included. The approach is illustrated with data on four risk factors from a pair-matched case-control study of participants in a multicenter breast cancer screening project.

UDCA treatment was associated with a non-statistically significant reduction in total colorectal adenoma recurrence but with a statistically significant 39% reduction in recurrence of adenomas with high-grade dysplasia. Because severely dysplastic lesions have a high risk of progression to invasive colorectal carcinoma, this finding indicates that future chemoprevention trials of UDCA in individuals with such lesions should be considered.

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A total of 1440 malignant astrocytic gliomas from three Phase III trials of the National Brain Tumor Study Group were studied to document the clinical usefulness of subclassifying these lesions as either an anaplastic astrocytoma or a glioblastoma multiforme. As defined by a previous "blind" pathology review, the two groups of patients were compared as to mean age, mean duration of preoperative symptoms, and postrandomization survival. In addition, 10 histologic variables were studied in 150 patients with the anaplastic astrocytoma to establish internal correlations, and to relate specific histologic variables to patient age and postrandomization survival. There were highly significant differences in the age, duration of preoperative symptoms, and post randomization survival between the two groups. Internal correlations between histologic variables in the anaplastic astrocytoma disclosed statistically significant associations between the presence of lymphocytes and gemistocytic astrocytes. It is concluded that the subclassification of malignant gliomas into the anaplastic astrocytoma and the glioblastoma multiforme defines groups of patients that are significantly different in regard to age, duration of symptoms, and length of survival. The problems of tissue sampling are recognized, however, the assignment, by a blind pathology review, to two such different groups indicates that the classification has utility for large randomized clinical trials. The analysis of histologic variables in the anaplastic astrocytomas confirms previous suggestions that lymphocytes and gemistocytes frequently coexist in malignant gliomas, but in this study these inflammatory cells did not appear to influence survival. The study reemphasizes the association between advancing age and shorter survivals in patients with malignant gliomas.

A B S T R A C T PurposeIntestinal stomas can pose significant challenges for long-term (Ն 5 years) rectal cancer (RC) survivors. Specifying common challenges and sociodemographic or clinical differences will further the development of tailored interventions to improve health-related quality of life (HRQOL). Patients and MethodsThis was a matched cross-sectional study of long-term RC survivors conducted in three Kaiser Permanente regions. The mailed questionnaire included the modified City of Hope Quality of Life-Ostomy (mCOH-QOLOstomy) and Medical Outcomes Study 36-Item Short-Form Health Survey, version 2 (SF-36v2). Groups surveyed were permanent ostomates (cases) and those who did not require an ostomy (controls). RC survivors were matched on sex, age, and time since diagnosis. Comparisons between groups used regression analysis with adjustment for age, comorbidity score, history of radiation therapy, income, and work status. Results Response rate was 54% (491 of 909). Cases and controls had similar demographic characteristics.On the basis of the mCOH-QOL-Ostomy, both male and female cases had significantly worse social well-being compared with controls, while only female cases reported significantly worse overall HRQOL and psychological well-being. For younger females (Ͻ age 75 years), ostomy had a greater impact on physical well-being compared with older females. Based on the SF-36v2, statistically significant and meaningful differences between female cases and controls were observed for seven of the eight scales and on the physical and mental component summary scores. ConclusionMen and women report a different profile of challenges, suggesting the need for targeted or sex-specific interventions to improve HRQOL in this population. This may include focus on physical HRQOL for female ostomy survivors younger than age 75.

Histologic sections from 71 patients with glioblastoma multiforme were reviewed to identify histologic prognostic factors and to explain the significantly shorter survival in older patients. Slides were studied for 14 histologic variables from a group of 35 patients aged less 45 years and from 36 patients aged 65 years or more. The relation of these histologic factors to the length of survival and age group was then investigated. The results document the marked histologic and cytologic heterogeneity of the glioblastoma and reaffirm the importance of necrosis as a prognostic factor. The results further suggest that patients whose glioblastomas contained microcysts, pseudopalisading, cells with astrocytic differentiation, and large areas of better differentiated glioma, did better than those patients whose lesions were homogeneously composed of small cells or whose lesion had a small median nuclear size. The study reaffirmed the strong (P less than 0.0001) negative relationship between advancing age and duration of postoperative survival. The presence of necrosis, a smaller standard deviation of nuclear size, the extent of vascular proliferation, the absence of well differentiated neoplastic fibrillary astrocytes, and neoplasms composed homogeneously of small cells were related to patient age and offered a possible explanation for at least part of the observed age effect. However, the strong relation between age and survival remained significant when adjusted for other variables, and the effect of age must rest largely on factors other than those detected in this morphologic study.

This study shows that the NCI clinical trials are, as a whole, racially/ethnically representative of the American population and suggests that there is equal access to NCI clinical trials.