Journal article
The potential value of sibling controls compared with population controls for association studies of lifestyle-related risk factors: An example from the breast cancer family registry
RL Milne, EM John, JA Knight, GS Dite, MC Southey, GG Giles, C Apicella, DW West, IL Andrulis, AS Whittemore, JL Hopper
International Journal of Epidemiology | Published : 2011
DOI: 10.1093/ije/dyr110
Abstract
Background: A previous Australian population-based breast cancer case-control study found indirect evidence that control participation, although high, was not random. We hypothesized that unaffected sisters may provide a more appropriate comparison group than unrelated population controls. Methods: Three population-based case-control-family studies of breast cancer in women of white European origin were carried out by the Australian, Ontario and Northern California sites of the Breast Cancer Family Registry. We compared risk factors between 3643 cases, 2444 of their unaffected sisters and 2877 population controls and conducted separate case-control analyses based on population and sister con..
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Awarded by National Institutes of Health
Funding Acknowledgements
The National Cancer Institute; National Institutes of Health under RFA (grant no. CA-06-503); the Breast Cancer Family Registry (BCFR); the University of Melbourne (grant no. U01 CA69638); Cancer Care Ontario (grant no. U01 CA69467); the Northern California Cancer Center (grant no. U01 CA69417); National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia (to the Australian Breast Cancer Family Study); the New South Wales Cancer Council; the Victorian Health Promotion Foundation; the National Institutes of Health Grant (grant no. U01CA 71966 to the Northern California Cancer Center); the Canadian Breast Cancer Research Initiative (Ontario).