Obese prostate cancer patients three times more likely to die from the disease
October 21st, 2008
Prostate cancer patients who are overweight are more likely to die from the disease, researchers warn. Survival rates for people with prostate cancer have improved over recent years, but the researchers say they could have been even better if fewer people had been obese or had high levels of insulin in the blood (hyperinsulinemia).
Overall, prostate cancer patients who were overweight had a 47 per cent higher risk of death from the disease than those with a healthy weight, and obese patients had 166 per cent increased risk, the researchers report. Their study of 2546 prostate cancer patients also revealed that patients with high levels of C-peptide – a molecule that is released when the body produces the hormone insulin – are more likely to die from cancer than those with low levels. Men with blood levels of C-peptide in the highest quarter for the sample were more than twice as likely (138 per cent more likely) to die from prostate cancer as those with blood C-peptide levels in the lowest quarter. And patients who were both overweight and had high blood C-peptide levels had a more than four times higher risk of dying from the disease (312 per cent more likely).
Obesity and type 2 diabetes are usually associated with insulin resistance and high blood levels of insulin.
Dr Abraham comments: This is an interesting finding from lead author Jing Ma from the Harvard Medical School in Boston, but we still have little information why obesity is a risk factor for many different cancers – not just prostate cancer. The link may be insulin or perhaps the related hormone insulin growth factor, of which there are many types. It would be worth finding out more which hormone or binding protein is a putative cancer stimulant before embarking on any clinical trials of antidiabetes or insulin sensitising drugs. Reduction of the risk of future cancer remains one of the main reasons to avoid obesity.
