Online PhD conferral mr. Jeroen A.A. van de Pol
Supervisor: prof.dr.ir. P.A. van den Brandt
Co-supervisors: dr. L.J. Schouten, dr. K. Kok, UMCG Groningen
Key words: epidemiology, oncology, renal cell carcinoma, heterogeneity, risk factors
"Renal Cell Cancer: an epidemiological approach to unravel disease heterogeneity"
The aetiology of RCC is still poorly understood. Although multiple risk factors have been investigated in relation to the risk of renal cell carcinoma (RCC) overall, little attention has been raised for the potential aetiologic heterogeneity between subtypes of RCC. In this thesis, the association between risk factors and various subtypes of RCC have been investigated using information obtained through the Netherlands Cohort Study on diet and cancer (NLCS). In 1986, 120,852 men and women aged 55-69 completed a questionnaire on dietary habits and other risk factors for cancer. During 20.3 years of follow-up, 608 cases of RCC were identified in the NLCS through record linkage with the Netherlands Cancer Registry (NCR), the Dutch Pathology Registry (PALGA) and Statistics Netherlands (CBS). Results of this thesis indicated potential differences in etiology between clear-cell RCC and papillary RCC, as body mass index (BMI) and the history of kidney stones were observed to be differently associated with these RCC subtypes.
