Abstract 1038: Examining racial disparities in the context of food security, poverty, and allostatic load
Authors: Jennifer M. Crook, Eunkyung Lee, Rui Xie, Ladda Thiamwong, Victoria Loerzel
Journal: Cancer Research (2025)

Abstract Intro: Disparities in cancer incidence and mortality remain a complex and elusive problem with diet well-studied as a contributing factor. However, it is unclear the impact of food and nutritional security on cancer risk. To fully appreciate nutritional inequities of both food insecurity (FI) and poverty within cancer, there remains a need to more closely examine racial/ethnic disparities in chronic inflammatory indicators of allostatic load. We have previously identified nutritional discrepancies between dietary intake report and plasma nutritional and inflammatory statuses. This study aimed to more clearly identify racial/ethnic disparities within FI, poverty, and allostatic load to develop targeted public health nutritional cancer interventions. Methods: The Vitamin/Mineral and Inflammatory Correlations To Understand Chronic Stress in the U.S.: The VICTUS Study is a cross-sectional study utilizing data from the 2017/2018 National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES) as a representative sample of U.S. adults. Subjective survey data was interrogated with objective laboratory analyses to observe associations between demographic, socioeconomic, health behaviors, nutrition status, and biomarkers of allostatic load (defined as systolic and diastolic blood pressure, body mass index, glucose, albumin, creatinine, HDL, LDL, triglycerides, hs-CRP, red cell distribution width, and cholesterol) to identify racial/ethnic disparities. Pearson’s chi-square, correlation, and ANOVA models were constructed. Results: From 3083 participants, 38.2% other Hispanic, 37.3% multi-racial, 35.2% Mexican American, and 26.4% non-Hispanic Black adults reported FI, while only 22.5% non-Hispanic White and 5.8% of Asian adults did. Allostatic load and inflammatory biomarkers of SBP, DBP, BMI, HDL, tri, RDW, hs-CRP, alb, creat, (p&amp;lt;0.001), and chol (p&amp;lt;0.05) exhibited significant racial/ethnic disparities. When surveying poverty, Mexican American (p &amp;lt; 0.001), multi-racial (p &amp;lt; 0.01), NH Black and other Hispanic (p &amp;lt; 0.05) exhibited increased rates when compared to NH White participants. There were also clear racial/ethnic disparities between FI report and plasma nutritional status with significant deficient and inadequate statuses seen in the following micronutrients B, C, D (p &amp;lt; 0.001), E (p &amp;lt; 0.01), Na, and Ca (p &amp;lt; 0.05). Discussion: This study found clear racial/ethnic disparities in FI, poverty, nutritional status, and inflammatory indicators of acute and chronic inflammation (allostatic load). Also identified were incongruences between self-reported FI and plasma nutritional status of many micronutrients with significant associations with race/ethnicity suggesting that current FI assessment may neither be adequately identifying nor intervening in those at highest risk of chronic inflammatory conditions contributing to increased cancer risk. Citation Format: Jennifer M. Crook, Eunkyung Lee, Rui Xie, Ladda Thiamwong, Victoria Loerzel. Examining racial disparities in the context of food security, poverty, and allostatic load [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2025; Part 1 (Regular Abstracts); 2025 Apr 25-30; Chicago, IL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2025;85(8_Suppl_1):Abstract nr 1038.