(HealthDay News) — Statin use alone or in combination with metformin is associated with lower all-cause and prostate cancer (PCa) mortality among high-risk patients, according to a study published online in Cancer Medicine.
Xiang-Lin Tan, MD, PhD, from Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, in New Brunswick, and colleagues used Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER)-Medicare linked data to quantify the individual and joint effects of statin and metformin use among 12,700 patients with high-risk PCa.
The researchers found that statin use alone or in combination with metformin was significantly associated with reduced all-cause mortality (hazard ratios, 0.89 and 0.75, respectively) and PCa mortality (hazard ratios, 0.80 and 0.64, respectively). In postdiagnosis users, the effect was greater with combination use of metformin/statins, with a 32% reduction in all-cause mortality and a 54% reduction in PCa mortality. There were no significant associations between metformin use alone and either all-cause mortality or PCa mortality. All brands of statins, except lovastatin, were significantly associated with the reduction in PCa mortality.
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“[The] combination of metformin and statin holds great promise for reducing all-cause or PCa mortality among patients with high-risk PCa, particularly in postdiagnostic settings,” the authors write.
Reference
Tan X-L, E J-Y, Lin Y, et al. Individual and joint effects of metformin and statins on mortality among patients with high‐risk prostate cancer. Canc Med. doi: 10.1002/cam4.2862
