P53 CODON-72 POLYMORPHISM AND RISK OF CERVICAL-CANCER IN UK

Background A polymorphism at codon 72 of the human tumour-suppressor g ene, p53, results in translation to either arginine or proline. A rece nt report suggested that the risk of human-papillomavirus;associated c ervical cancer in white women is higher for those homozygous for the a rginine allele than for those who are heterozygous. We examined a simi lar number of cervical cancers and a larger control group for their p5 3 codon 72 polymorphism status to see if we could confirm this result. Methods Three different groups of UK white women were studied: 96 who had volunteered to take part in a trial of ovarian-cancer screening; 150 attending for routine antenatal care in the Oxford region; and 50 women with cervical cancer. DNA from peripheral blood samples and from archival tissue samples was examined by PCR with allele-specific prim ers. Findings The proportions of individuals homozygous for the argini ne allele, homozygous for the proline allele, and heterozygous for the two alleles were 59%, 4%, and 36% among women screened for ovarian ca ncer; 65%, 8%, and 27% among the antenatal-care group; and 54%, 6%, an d 40% in women with cervical cancer. chi(2) analysis showed no signifi cant differences in these proportions. Interpretation In the populatio n studied, individuals homozyous for the arginine variant of codon 72 of the p53 gene were not at increased risk of cervical cancer.