A greater birthweight increases the risk of acute leukemias in Mexican children—experience from the Mexican Interinstitutional Group for the Identification of the Causes of Childhood Leukemia (MIGICCL)

Abstract

In Mexico, due to the high rates of diabetes, overweight, and obesity, there has also been noted an increased newborn weight, which may be contributing to the elevated incidence rate of childhood acute leukemia (AL). We conducted a case–control study in public hospitals of Mexico City aimed to know whether a greater weight at birth is associated with a higher risk of developing leukemia. We included incident cases with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) and acute myeloid leukemia (AML) diagnosed between 2010 and 2015. Controls were frequency‐matched to the cases by age, sex, and health institution. Logistic regression analysis was performed adjusting risks by child's sex, overcrowding index, birth order, and mother's age at the time of pregnancy. Adjusted odds ratios (aORs) and 95% confidence intervals were calculated. A total of 1455 cases and 1455 controls were included. An evident association between ALL and child's birthweight ≥2500 g was found (aOR 2.06; 95% CI: 1.59, 2.66) and also, in those with birthweight ≥3500 g (aOR 1.19; 95% CI: 1.00, 1.41). In AML patients with birthweight ≥2500 g and ≥3500 g, an aOR of 1.77 (95% CI: 1.07, 2.94) and 1.42 (95% CI: 1.03–1.95) was observed, respectively. No association was noticed with either type of AL and a birthweight ≥4000 g. To sum up, we found a moderate association between not having a low birthweight and an increased risk of acute leukemias. Birthweight ≥3500 g was also a risk factor for both types of leukemia. This suggests that a greater birthweight may increase the risk of acute leukemias in Mexican children.

Health coverage for people without social security in Mexico: a retrospective cohort to assess childhood acute lymphoblastic leukaemia survival

“…And contrary to expectations that sustained financing would result in improvements in quality of care, our analysis did not provide evidence for an increasing trend in survival over time. While overall the proportion of high-risk patients is similar to a previous study in Mexico City, 16 this observation could be explained by an increase in the proportion of high-risk patients over time. The lack of improvement in survival is consistent with CONCORD-3 ALL survival estimates for Mexico for the same period.…”

Breastfeeding and the risk of childhood cancer: a systematic review and dose-response meta-analysis

“…After removal of duplicates, 5545 articles were retrieved for assessment based on title and abstract, of which 116 articles were included for full text evaluation. After exclusion of 8 articles with insufficient data, 4 articles only reporting data on all cancers, 47 articles as meta, review, comment or meeting abstract, 2 articles conducted not among children, and 10 articles with overlapping data sets (Additional file 1: Table S2), a total of 45 articles with 475,579 participants were included for this meta-analysis [ 13 , 14 , 17 , 18 , 33 – 73 ].…”

“…The details of included studies for the subsequent subgroup analysis are shown in Additional file 1: Table S3. Moreover, after excluding studies with the breastfeeding only as dichotomous variable, and no sufficient data of the number of cases and controls in each breastfeeding category, 23 studies were included for leukemia [ 13 , 14 , 18 , 34 – 36 , 38 – 43 , 46 , 47 , 54 , 56 , 58 , 61 , 63 , 64 , 70 – 72 ], 6 studies for lymphoma [ 14 , 33 , 36 , 40 , 43 , 46 ], and 6 studies for brain tumors [ 14 , 40 , 44 , 51 , 64 , 67 ] in dose-response meta-analysis.…”

“…However, Wang et al [ 16 ] provided limited evidence for a protective role of breastfeeding in childhood Hodgkin's lymphoma. Other publications have even reported that prolonged breastfeeding was positively associated with the risk of childhood malignant germ cell tumors [ 17 ] and leukemia [ 18 ].…”

Is There a Causal Relationship between Childhood Obesity and Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia? A Review

“…Chromosomal translocations such as t(12:21), t(4:11) or t(8:21) contribute to the uncontrolled proliferation of lymphoblasts, and high birth weight may drive this proliferation with high levels of growth factors [ 43 , 44 , 46 , 48 , 49 , 50 , 51 ]. Furthermore, having a high birth weight when corrected for gestational age and rapid fetal growth rates predict ALL risk during childhood [ 45 , 47 ].…”