Uterine fibroids, benign tumors of the uterus, are the most common female pelvic tumor. Fibroids are highly heterogeneous, with some women developing a single small fibroid while other women develop multiple and/or large fibroids. In addition, racial disparities in fibroid size and number support that fibroid characteristics have a genetic component. For example, African American (AA) women have more numerous and larger fibroids than European American (EA) women. Furthermore, AAs are two times more likely than EAs to receive surgical treatments for fibroids such as a hysterectomy. Unfortunately, most research on fibroids to date has not evaluated risk factors for specific fibroid characteristics. The purpose of this thesis is to provide a deeper understanding on both epidemiology and genetic risk factors of fibroid characteristics, fibroid number (single vs. multiple), volume of largest fibroid, and largest dimension of all fibroid measurements. After identifying epidemiologic risk factors for fibroid characteristics, this study identified several novel genetic loci associating with either fibroid size or number by methods of genome-wide association studies (GWAS) and admixture mapping studies. Lastly, this study estimated heritability of fibroids and fibroid size.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:VANDERBILT/oai:VANDERBILTETD:etd-03202018-130931 |
| Date | 20 March 2018 |
| Creators | Bray, Michael Joseph |
| Contributors | Bingshan Li, Melissa F. Wellons, Todd L. Edwards, Nancy J. Cox, Digna R. Velez Edwards, David C. Samuels |
| Publisher | VANDERBILT |
| Source Sets | Vanderbilt University Theses |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.library.vanderbilt.edu/available/etd-03202018-130931/ |
| Rights | restrictone, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to Vanderbilt University or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
Page generated in 0.002 seconds