From I984 to I988 a population-based case-control study was carried out in the Netherlands in collaboration with the International Agency for Research on Cancer, to examine the possible relationship between habitual, life-time consumption of varieties of tobacco and exocrine pancreatic carcinoma in I76 cases and 487 controls. An interviewer-administered questionnaire was used to list major life events and obtain estimates of usual frequency of tobacco consumption throughout life. About 58% of patients were interviewed directly.
After adjustment for age, gender, response status, energy intake and consumption of vegetables compared with neversmokers, a positive dose-response effect of smoking of life-time number of total cigarettes, i.e. non-filter and filter, emerged (OR 1.00, 1.35, I .40 and 2.10, p-value trend < 0.05). Results of simultaneous estimation of the effects of life-time smoking of non-filter and filter cigarettes suggest that the effect was present primarily in non-filter cigarettes. The dose-response relationship was present in current smokers only. Compared with never-smokers, the risk pattern among relatively recent quitters, i.e. 2 to 14 years previously, still suggested a positive effect of past smoking (OR for low smokers 1.99, 95% CI 0.79499 and for high smokers 1.69, 95% CI 0.63-4.58). The risk of quitting I5 years or more could be examined in the low smoking group only and was no different from those who had never smoked (OR I .02,95% CI 0.47-2.20).
In brief, our results suggest that, independent of usual past intake of energy and vegetables, life-time smoking of cigarettes influences the development of exocrine pancreatic cancer, whereas cessation of smoking of cigarettes for I 5 years or more reduces the risk to the levels found among those who have never smoked.