Estrogen decrease coronary artery disease risk in patients with cervical cancer after treatment

Abstract

Background: The purpose of this study was to explore the possible association between coronary artery disease (CAD) risk and cervical cancer.

Methods: We used data from the National Health Insurance system of Taiwan to address the research topic. The exposure cohort contained 728 patients with cervical cancer. Each cancer patient was randomly frequency-matched with 4 participants by age, index-month, and index-year from the general population who did not have a cancer history before the index date (control group). Cox's proportion hazard regression analyses were conducted to estimate the relationship between cervical cancer and CAD risk.

Results: Among patients with cervical cancer, the overall risk for developing CADs was significantly lower than that of the control group [adjusted hazard ratio (aHR): 0.57, 95% confidence interval (95% CI): 0.41-0.79]. Further analyses revealed that the lower risk was observed only in patients with older age (aHR: 0.57, 95% CI: 0.40-0.82), a shorter follow-up duration (aHR: 0.47, 95% CI: 0.31-0.72), or with estrogen supplements (aHR: 0.39, 95% CI: 0.22-0.68).

Conclusions: The findings from this population-based study suggest that estrogen supplements are associated with a decreased CAD risk in patients with cervical cancer.