Ovarian cancer risk linked to socioeconomic status in African American women

Higher socioeconomic status is associated with lower ovarian cancer risk in African-American women, according to a new study led by investigators at the Medical University of South Carolina. It was published online August 3 in the American Journal of Epidemiology.

The research showed the risk of ovarian cancer was 29 percent lower among women with a college degree or more compared with those who had a high school degree or less. Similarly, the risk of ovarian cancer was 26 percent lower among women with a household income of $75,000 or greater compared with women whose household incomes were $10,000 or less.

The study was led by Anthony Alberg, Ph.D., interim director of the MUSC Hollings Cancer Center and professor in the Department of Public Health Sciences. The MUSC Hollings Cancer Center is a National Cancer Institute-designated cancer center and the largest academic-based cancer research program in South Carolina. 

The population-based case-control study took place in Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, Louisiana, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, South Carolina, Tennessee and Texas. The study participants, all of whom self-identified as African American, included 513 women diagnosed with ovarian cancer and a comparison group of 721 women without cancer. The inverse association with socioeconomic status held true even after controlling for factors known to be associated with ovarian cancer risk, such as body mass index and a family history of ovarian or breast cancer.

“For most types of cancer, people with lower socioeconomic status are at greater risk. However, the opposite is true for breast cancer, another hormone-related type of cancer that shares many risk factors with ovarian cancer,” Alberg said.

“The evidence to date for ovarian cancer is limited and has not yielded clear-cut results. This study represents a major step forward in helping to shed light on the relationship between socioeconomic status and ovarian cancer, with results clearly pointing in the direction of higher disease risk in women of lower socioeconomic status—the opposite of what we see for breast cancer.”  

None of the previous studies addressing this question focused on women of African ancestry. By establishing an association between lower socioeconomic status and higher disease risk in African-American women, the study raises questions about socioeconomic status and ovarian cancer risk in other populations that will need to be answered in future studies. 

“Important next steps will be to establish whether this same association holds true in women of other races and ethnicities,” said Alberg. “Then we will need to determine the root causes of this relationship between socioeconomic status and ovarian cancer so that we can learn if this may lead to new clues about prevention.”