Title: Cancer and blood concentrations of the comutagen harmane in essential tremor.

Authors: Louis, Elan D; Pellegrino, Kathryn M; Factor-Litvak, Pam; Rios, Eileen; Jiang, Wendy; Henchcliffe, Claire; Zheng, Wei

Published In Mov Disord, (2008 Sep 15)

Abstract: Blood concentrations of harmane, a tremor-producing neurotoxin, are elevated in essential tremor (ET). Harmane is also a comutagen. Using a case-control design, we compared the prevalence of cancer in ET cases vs. controls, and determined whether blood harmane concentrations are elevated among ET cases with cancer. 66/267 (24.7%) ET cases vs. 55/331 (16.6%) controls had cancer (adjusted OR 1.52, 95% CI 1.01-2.30, P = 0.04). Among specific cancer types, colon cancer was more prevalent in ET cases than controls (2.6% vs. 0.6%, P = 0.04). Log blood harmane concentration was higher in ET cases vs. controls (P = 0.02) and in participants with vs. without cancer (P = 0.02). Log blood harmane concentration was highest in ET cases with cancer when compared with other groups (P = 0.009). These links between cancer and ET and between high blood harmane and cancer in ET deserve further study.

PubMed ID: 18709680

MeSH Terms: Aged; Chi-Square Distribution; Essential Tremor/blood*; Essential Tremor/genetics*; Female; Harmine/analogs & derivatives*; Harmine/blood; Harmine/genetics; Humans; Male; Middle Aged; Neoplasms/blood*; Neoplasms/genetics*