Dietary intake of one-carbon metabolism-related nutrients and hepatocellular carcinoma survival in the Guangdong Liver Cancer Cohort

Abstract

Dietary intake of one-carbon metabolism-related nutrients has been linked to cancer-related outcomes, but their effects on hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) mortality are still unknown. The objective was to assess whether pre-diagnostic dietary intakes of methionine, folate, Vitamin B6, Vitamin B12, riboflavin and niacin are associated with HCC survival in this prospective cohort study. In total, 905 newly diagnosed HCC patients were recruited in the Guangdong Liver Cancer Cohort study between September 2013 and April 2017. Dietary intake was assessed using a validated 79-item food frequency questionnaire. Cox proportional hazard regression models were utilized to calculate hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for the overall and HCC-specific mortality. During a median of 791 days of follow-up, we documented 395 deaths, 353 (89%) of which resulted from HCC. The multivariate-adjusted HRs in the highest vs. the lowest quartile of methionine intake were 0.59 (95% CI: 0.42–0.80; P for trend = 0.001) for overall mortality and 0.68 (95% CI: 0.49–0.93; P for trend = 0.027) for HCC-specific mortality. However, no significant association of other micronutrients involved in one-carbon metabolism with HCC survival was observed. Our research suggests that a high level of methionine intake, but no other one-carbon metabolism-related nutrients, may improve survival in patients with newly diagnosed HCC.