Telomere Shortening Caused By Poor Environments Could Lead To Increased Prostate Cancer Risk

In a 2019 study published in the National Institutes of Health, it was hypothesized that telomere shortening could be a mechanism that linked neighborhoods and poor health outcomes

The stress of poverty has long been associated with shortened telomeres, and a 2013 study indicated that these shortened telomeres had a negative effect on the health outcomes of chronically poor people. Now, new research indicates that these poor health outcomes could also explain poor prostate health.

According to U.S. News and World Report, the stress of living in a poor neighborhood may act in a similar manner to the stress of an impoverished childhood. Initial research from the University of Maryland School of Medicine suggests that that particular stressor, which tends to affect Black people more than others, may help aggressive forms of prostate cancer spread in Black men.

In a 2019 study published by the National Institutes of Health, it was hypothesized that telomere shortening could be a mechanism that linked neighborhoods and poor health outcomes. As the study explained, “Neighborhoods are thought to exert significant influences on health via stress, altered health behaviors, and other unknown mechanisms…poor neighborhood environment has been associated with increased BMI, poor cardiovascular health, and poor self-rated health. Neighborhood deprivation is an area-level indicator for socioeconomic disadvantage that can provide contextual evidence for an individual’s environment, demonstrating distinctive associations with health outcomes compared to individual-level socioeconomic resources.”

As Kathryn Hughes Barry, a senior researcher and associate professor of epidemiology and public health at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, told U.S. News, “Our findings suggest an impact of living in disadvantaged neighborhoods — which more commonly affects African Americans — on stress-related genetic pathways in the body. We believe this may increase an individual’s risk of aggressive prostate cancer and contribute to prostate cancer disparities by race.”

In the study, researchers analyzed 105 stress-related genes of 218 Black and white men with cancer, all of whom underwent surgery at the university’s medical center to have their prostate removed between 1992 and 2021. The research team used their addresses at the time of their procedure to determine if they lived in neighborhoods that were underserved. The study noted that additional research using larger studies will be needed to determine any relationship between a person’s environment and aggressive forms of prostate cancer.

According to the study’s conclusion, “In conclusion, we identified several suggestive associations between neighborhood disadvantage metrics and prostate tumor RNA expression of stress-related genes among African American and White men with prostate cancer, which warrant follow-up in larger studies. These findings support a potential link between neighborhood factors and stress-related pathways, which may in turn contribute to an increased risk of aggressive prostate cancer. Additional research is needed to further investigate the interrelationships of neighborhood factors, individual factors, prostate tumor biology, tumor aggressiveness, and prostate cancer outcomes, including mediation analyses with survival outcomes, to help inform interventions that will reduce prostate cancer disparities.”