Islamabad (Pakistan Point News / Online - 12th May, 2019) Previous research has suggested a link between the presence of diabetes and a person's risk of cancer. Now, a large study in a Chinese population shows that type 2 diabetes is associated with an increased risk of cancer though females and males seem to be more at risk of different forms..Earlier this week, Medical news Today reportedon a study showing that people who have cancerand diabetes may have an increased risk that their malignant tumors will spread.
The study, which explains the likely biological mechanism underlying this risk, was spurred by other research suggesting a link between diabetes and cancer.Now, investigators many from the Shanghai Jiao Tong University school of Medicine, in China have published the results of an analysis conducted using the medical data of a large Chinese cohort. The research paper, the first author of which is Jiying Qi, appears in the Journal of Diabetes.
The researchers also note that their country has a very high prevalence of both diabetes and prediabetes, as reports have shown.The team identified 410,191 adults aged between 20 and 99 who had a diagnosis of type 2 diabetes between July 2013 and December 2016. At that time, none of these people had cancer.Qi and colleagues followed the medical records of these individuals through to December 2017, to see which people developed cancer and what form of cancer their doctors diagnosed.
Significantly higher risk of cancerBy the end of 2017, the researchers had identified 8,485 cases of cancer among the initial cohort, and the investigators soon realized that males with type 2 diabetes and females with the same condition had a higher risk of distinct types of cancer.The researchers found that, among people with type 2 diabetes, males had a 34% higher risk of cancer than their healthy peers, and females had a 62% percent higher risk.
Males with type 2 diabetes were more at risk of as many as 11 different forms of cancer, while females were more at risk of 13 different forms.More specifically, males with type 2 diabetes had an 86% increase in the risk of prostate cancer, compared with their healthy counterparts.They also had a significant risk of leukemia, skin cancer, thyroid cancer, lymphoma, kidney cancer, liver cancer, pancreatic cancer, lung cancer, colorectal cancer, and stomach cancer.However, males with the metabolic condition appeared to have a lower risk of developing esophageal cancer.
