Serum selenium and subsequent risk of cancer among finnish men and women

Abstract

The association between the serum selenium level and the subsequent incidence of cancer was investigated in a longitudinal study of 39, 268 men and women participating in the Social Insurance Institution's Mobile Clinic Health Examination Survey in Finland. The baseline examinations, including the collection of blood samples, were performed in 1968-1972. During a median followup of 10 years, 1, 096 new cancer cases were identified from the files of the Finish Cancer Registry. Selenium concentrations were measured from the stored serum samples collected from these cancer cases and from two controls per case, matched for sex, municipality, and age. The mean serum selenium level was 59.1 μg/L among all male cancer cases and 62.5 μg/L among controls. The difference was statistically significant (P