Body Mass Index and Risk of Gastric Cancer in Asian Adults:A Meta-Epidemiological Meta-Analysis of Population-BasedCohort Studies / Journal of the Korean Cancer Association, 대한암학회지

ABSTRACT

Purpose@#A previous meta-analysis (MA) published in 2009 reported that excess body weight wasassociated with an increased risk of gastric cancer in non-Asians, but not in Asians. The aimwas to conduct a meta-epidemiological MA (MEMA) to evaluate association between excessbody weight and the risk of gastric cancer in Asian adults with using the proposed classificationof weight by body mass index (BMI) in Asian adults. @*Materials and Methods@#The selection criteria were population-based prospective cohort studies that measured BMIof cohort participants and evaluated a risk of gastric cancer. Overweight group (OW) andobesity group (OB) were defined as 23.0-24.9 and ! 25.0, respectively. A group only showing @*results@#for BMI over 23.0 was defined as overweight and obesity group (OWB). Randomeffect model was applied if I2 value was over 50%. @*Results@#After four new studies were added through citation discovery tools, seven cohort studieswith 21 datasets were selected finally for MEMA. The I2 value of OW, OB, and OWB were76.1%, 83.5%, and 97.1%, respectively. Only OWB in men had a I2 value below 50% (22.5%)and showed a statistical significance with inverse association (summary relative risk, 0.79;95% confidence interval, 0.77 to 0.81). @*Conclusion@#This MEMA supported the hypothesis that OW might be a protective factor in gastric cancerrisk in Asian adults. It will be necessary to conduct additional cohort studies with lengtheningfollow-up periods and re-analyzing the effect of overweight and obesity classified by theAsian criteria.