ASSOCIATION BETWEEN DIETARY PATTERNS AND RISK OF BREAST CANCER AMONG POLISH MIGRANT WOMEN TO THE UNITED STATESByAzam Najafkouchak Diet and breast cancer has been a focus of many studies, however, most of them evaluated the association between specific nutrients or foods and breast cancer risk, and only few have assessed the effect of dietary patterns. This study examined the association between dietary patterns and the risk of breast cancer in Polish migrant women to the US. Analyses were based on data from the US component of the Polish Women's Health Study (138 breast cancer cases and 284 frequency matched controls). Using factor analysis, six factors were retained and based on food groups that had high loadings on a given pattern, were labeled as follows: "healthy Western", "unhealthy Western", "Polish", "alcohol drinker", `high in dairy fat/sugar" and "meat/potatoes". Only the "Polish" dietary pattern emerged as significantly reducing breast cancer risk. The observed odds ratios (OR) and confidence intervals (CI), when comparing highest vs. lowest quartile, were: 1) OR=0.49; 95% CI: 0.25-0.98, for all women, 2) OR=0.48; 95% CI: 0.16-1.43, for pre-menopausal women, and OR=0.29; 95% CI: 0.11-0.81 for post-menopausal women. Results for the other dietary patterns were consistent with those previously observed in literature. The "healthy Western" dietary pattern showed a trend towards reduced breast cancer risk and the "alcohol drinker" dietary pattern, showed a trend towards increased breast cancer risk. This study supports the hypothesis that traditional Polish diet, high in consumption of cabbage foods, has a potential to reduce breast cancer risk.
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