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©The Author(s) 2024. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
Retrospective study evaluating association of colorectal tumors and hepatitis C virus
Maya Gogtay, Lekha Yadukumar, Yuvaraj Singh, Mithil Gowda Suresh, Aakriti Soni, Anuroop Yekula, Asha Bullappa, George M Abraham
Maya Gogtay, Department of Hematology and Oncology, Internal Medicine, University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha, NE 68198, United States
Lekha Yadukumar, Department of Internal Medicine, The Wright Center for Graduate Medical Education, Scranton, PA 18505, United States
Yuvaraj Singh, Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School, Worcester, MA 01605, United States
Mithil Gowda Suresh, Aakriti Soni, George M Abraham, Department of Internal Medicine, Saint Vincent Hospital, Worcester, MA 01608, United States
Anuroop Yekula, Department of Internal Medicine, St. Vincent Hospital, Worcester, MA 01608, United States
Asha Bullappa, Department of Community Medicine, SS Institute of Medical Sciences and Research Centre, Davangere 577003, Karnataka, India
Author contributions: Yekula A conceived the idea for the study; Gogtay M, Singh Y, and Yekula A designed and undertook the literature review, collected data; Gogtay M and Bullappa A performed the statistical analysis and interpreted the data; Gogtay M, Singh Y, and Yadukumar L wrote the first draft of the manuscript; Gogtay M, Singh Y, Yadukumar L, Soni A, and Abraham GM revised the subsequent drafts of the manuscript; All authors reviewed and agreed on the final draft of the manuscript.
Institutional review board statement: IRB#2021-035 MetroWest Medical Center, Framingham, MA provided IRB approval in 2021.
Informed consent statement: A waiver of consent was approved in accordance with 45 CFR 46. 116 (e) 1 according to IRB#2021-035.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All authors declare that the research was conducted without any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.
Data sharing statement: The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, [author initials], upon reasonable request.
STROBE statement: The authors have read the STROBE Statement – checklist of items, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the STROBE Statement – checklist of items.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4. 0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See:
https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/ Corresponding author: Yuvaraj Singh, MD, Doctor, Research Fellow, Department of Gastroen
terology and Hepatology, University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School, 55 N Lake Ave, Worcester, MA 01605, United States.
yuvarajmle@gmail.com
Received: February 1, 2024
Revised: June 4, 2024
Accepted: June 28, 2024
Published online: September 25, 2024
Processing time: 210 Days and 6.9 Hours
BACKGROUND
Chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) has been associated with hepatic and extrahepatic malignancies. Limited studies have shown an association between colorectal adenomas and HCV populations.
AIM
To study the prevalence of colorectal adenomas in patients with HCV compared to the general population and to evaluate if it is an independent risk factor for colorectal adenomas.
METHODS
Patients were divided into HCV and non-HCV based on their HCV RNA titers. Patients with alcoholic liver disease, hepatitis B infection, and inflammatory bowel disease were excluded. Continuous variables were analyzed using the Mann-Whitney U test, and categorical variables using χ2 with P < 0.05 were considered statistically significant. The significant covariates (independent variables) were matched in both groups by propensity score matching, followed by multivariate regression analysis.
RESULTS
Of the 415 patients screened, 109 HCV patients and 97 non-HCV patients with colonoscopy results were included in the study. HCV patients were older, had a smoking history, had less frequent aspirin use, and had a lower body mass index (BMI) (P < 0.05). The HCV cohort had a significantly increased number of patients with adenomas (adenoma detection rate of 53.2% vs 34%. P = 0.006). We performed a propensity-matched multivariate analysis where HCV infection was significantly associated with colorectal adenoma (OR: 2.070, P = 0.019).
CONCLUSION
Our study shows a significantly higher rate of adenomas in HCV patients compared to the general population. Prospective studies would help determine if the increase in adenoma detection lowers the risk for colorectal cancer.
Core Tip: There is a paucity of data to suggest the role of chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection and its role with extraintestinal malignancies. Given prior data to suggest HCV is an oncogenic virus, we reviewed its association in patients with colorectal neoplasia.
