Multivitamin use during pregnancy cuts childhood tumor risk

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http://www.healthy.net/asp/templates/news.asp?Id=5903 Multivitamin use during

pregnancy cuts childhood tumor risk

 

 

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The largest epidemiologic study ever conducted in North America of a childhood

nervous system cancer known as neuroblastoma suggests women who take

multivitamins during pregnancy can cut their children's risk of the tumor by

30-40%.

Researchers could not pinpoint which vitamin or vitamins were most responsible

for the reduced risk, but say their findings support and are consistent with

earlier studies indicating vitamin use during pregnancy seems to help protect

against childhood leukemias and brain tumors.

A report on the study, conducted chiefly at the University of North Carolina at

Chapel Hill, appears in the journal Epidemiology. Researchers at the University

of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, the UT Health Science Center in

San Antonio and the University of Minnesota also helped with the study.

" Neuroblastoma is a peripheral nervous system tumor in children, " said Dr.

Andrew F. Olshan, professor of epidemiology at the UNC School of Public Health

and a member of the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center. " It is the most

common tumor diagnosed in infants and is usually diagnosed in children under age

3. Typically, fewer than 50% of affected patients live 5 years following

diagnosis. "

Olshan and colleagues identified 538 children with neuroblastoma in 139 U.S. and

Canadian hospitals that belong to the Children's Oncology Group, a collaborative

group of health centers that conduct treatment and epidemiologic studies of

childhood cancer. Through random-digit telephone dialing, they also selected 504

comparable control subject children without the illness.

Researchers then interviewed mothers of both groups to learn about their vitamin

use before, during and after pregnancy and other possible health- and

illness-related factors. They also adjusted for as many potentially confounding

factors as they could - such as education and income - and compared the two

groups statistically.

" Findings of our case-control study suggest a beneficial association but do not

prove one, " the UNC scientist said. " Also, the specific vitamin or vitamins

potentially responsible for the reduction in risk are uncertain. "

More study, especially laboratory work, needs to be done to evaluate and prove

whether individual vitamins or combinations of them can prevent neuroblastomas

from forming or progressing, Olshan said. Still, the new results are

encouraging.

" Our finding, combined with previous work on reducing several birth defects with

vitamin supplementation and other childhood cancers, supports the recommendation

that mothers' vitamin use before and during pregnancy may benefit their babies'

health, " he said. " We believe physicians and other health care providers should

continue to educate women about these benefits and recommend appropriate dietary

habits and daily dietary supplements. "

Among nutrients researchers believe might reduce the incidence of childhood

cancers are folic acid, and vitamins C and A, but the specific vitamin

responsible remains unknown, Olshan said. National recommendations and

educational campaigns to promote prenatal vitamin use to prevent some birth

defects such as spina bifida, specifically folic acid, began in 1992. This

article was prepared by Cancer Weekly editors from staff and other reports.

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