ADT and BC Risk in Patients With Prostate Cancer

Bladder cancer (BC) is more common in men than women. While the exact aetiology of bladder cancer remains unclear, sex hormones are thought to play a role. As such, it has been postulated that androgen deprivation therapy (ADT), a common treatment for prostate cancer (PCa), may reduce the risk of bladder cancer in men.

Josephine M Hyldgaard and the team aimed to examine the association between androgen deprivation therapy (chemical or surgical castration) and the incidence of bladder cancer in men diagnosed with prostate cancer.

The study used data from national Danish registries. A cohort of men diagnosed with PCa between 2002 and 2018 was identified and categorized based on whether they received antihormonal treatment (chemical castration, surgical castration, or no treatment) within the first year of diagnosis.

Each patient with PCa was matched with 10 age-matched individuals from the general population (comparison cohort). Cumulative incidence of BC, overall survival (OS), and BC-specific mortality were the main outcomes that were analyzed.

The study included 48,776 patients with PCa. The 5-year risk of BC was numerically lower in men who received any form of ADT (chemical castration: 0.7%, surgical castration: 1.1%) compared to those who did not receive ADT (1.3%). However, this difference was not statistically significant after adjusting for confounding factors. There was no association found between ADT and OS.

The study found that ADT, in the form of chemical or surgical castration, was not associated with a statistically significant reduction in BC incidence among patients with PCa.

Funding was not given.

Source: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39319939/

Hyldgaard JM, Nørgaard M, Hjort PE, et al. (2024). “Bladder cancer incidence and mortality among men with and without castration therapy for prostate cancer – a nation-wide cohort study.” Acta Oncol. 2024;63:746-754. Published 2024 Sep 25. doi:10.2340/1651-226X.2024.40969