Cancer Mortality among US Men and Women with Asthma and Hay Fever

Abstract

The relation between self-reported physician-diagnosed asthma and/or hay fever and cancer mortality was explored in a prospective cohort study of 1,102,247 US men and women who were cancer-free at baseline. During 18 years of follow-up, from 1982 to 2000, there were 81,114 cancer deaths. Cox proportional hazards models were used to obtain adjusted relative risks for all cancer mortality and for cancer mortality at 12 sites associated with allergy indicators. There were significant inverse associations between a history of both asthma and hay fever and overall cancer mortality (relative risk (RR) = 0.88, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.83, 0.93) and colorectal cancer mortality (RR = 0.76, 95% CI: 0.64, 0.91) in comparison with persons with neither of these allergic conditions. A history of hay fever only was associated with a significantly lowered risk of pancreatic cancer mortality, and a history of asthma only was associated with a significantly lowered risk of leukemia mortality. In never smokers, these associations persisted but were no longer significant. Results for mortality from cancer at other sites were less consistent. Collectively, these results suggest an inverse association between a history of allergy and cancer mortality; however, the strength of evidence for this association is limited.

Cancer risk in hospitalised asthma patients

“…According to a recent review on cancer risk in asthma (Turner et al, 2006), only one Finnish cohort study has shown a positive association (Vesterinen et al, 1993), but significant only for men. The number of cancer cases in our study was almost the sum of cases in three earlier cohort studies (Kallen et al, 1993;Vesterinen et al, 1993;Turner et al, 2005). For the cancers overall, the highest risks were noted during the first year after last hospital admission for asthma, which could be due to lead time bias because of concomitant diagnosis.…”

“…The increased risks in cancers of the colon, liver, and pancreas have not been reported earlier and most earlier studies have shown a reduced risk or risk close to unity (Vesterinen et al, 1993;Talbot-Smith et al, 2003;Turner et al, 2005). The excess of colon cancer increased with the number of hospital admissions and the SIR was 1.99 for those hospitalised more than 5 times, highest for any cancer, suggesting a true aetiological link.…”

“…Overall, a 36% excess incidence of cancer was noted among asthma patients who had been treated in hospitals. Most earlier studies reported a reverse association or no association between asthma and the overall cancer risk (Kallen et al, 1993;Turner et al, 2005Turner et al, , 2006; a Swedish study from the earlier days of the Hospital Discharge Register reported a decreased mortality of 66% (Kallen et al, 1993). According to a recent review on cancer risk in asthma (Turner et al, 2006), only one Finnish cohort study has shown a positive association (Vesterinen et al, 1993), but significant only for men.…”

Allergies are associated with reduced pancreas cancer risk: A population‐based case–control study in Ontario, Canada

“…[13][14][15][16][17][18] Risk differed between men and women, and depended on the type of allergy and cancer site. [14][15][16]19 In a cohort study by Soderberg et al (2004), there was at least a doubling of risk of certain types of leukemia among individuals with hives.…”

Primary brain tumours and specific serum immunoglobulin E: a case–control study nested in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition cohort

“…A Swedish register-based cohort study, which included younger and older participants (median age of 30 and 54 years, respectively), found that glioma and meningioma increased risks of the younger and decreased risks of the older age group (10). A further register-based retrospective cohort study reported a positive association between atopic dermatitis and all brain tumours (11), whereas other cohort studies showed no association with allergies (12,13).…”