STUDY OF ANTI-HTLV-1 ANTIBODY FREQUENCY IN GASTRIC CANCER AND COLORECTAL CANCER PATIENTS IN COMPARE TO CONTROL GROUP

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Several different factors play role in developing gastric and colon cancers including infectious agents. Since there is no study about association of human T-lymphotropic virus 1 (HTLV-1) with cancers of digestive organ yet, so this study was performed to investigate the frequency of this infection in patients infected with gastric and colorectal cancers. METHODS: This project was performed as a case-control study between years 2009 to 2012. Two hundred and sixty five patients were cases of gastric and colorectal cancer confirmed by pathology and 244 healthy subjects were those who underwent endoscopy and colonoscopy and shown no sign of abnormality. We used third generation ELISA on sera of these people to assess their anti-HTLV-1 antibody status. FINDINGS: Two hundred and one GC patients, 64 CRC patients and 244 control subjects were enrolled in this study. Mean age of GC patients in the time of diagnosis was 59.24±12.50 years, CRC patients 58.98±13.39 and control subjects 57.83±11.25 years. One GC patient was positive for HTLV-1 antibody, no CRC patient was positive, while 4 control subjects had antibody against HTLV-1. There was no significant relationship between antibody positivity and gastric cancer or colorectal cancer. CONCLUSION: On the basis of current study, even though the rate of infection with this virus in GC patients was lower than control subjects.