Abstract
Background:An increased lymphoma risk is well documented in systemic lupus (SLE). Less attention has been focused on women's cancers, even though SLE affects mostly females. Our objective was to estimate the risk of breast, ovarian, and endometrial cancers in SLE, relative to the general population.Methods:Data were included from five recent studies of large SLE cohorts. The number of cancers observed was determined for each cancer type. The expected number of malignancies was ascertained from general population data. The parameter of interest was the standardised incidence ratio (SIR), the ratio of observed to expected malignancies.Results:The five studies included 47 325 SLE patients (42 171 females) observed for 282 553 patient years. There were 376 breast cancers, 66 endometrial cancers, and 44 ovarian cancers. The total number of cancers observed was less than that expected, with SIRs of 0.76 (95% CI: 0.69, 0.85) for breast cancer, 0.71 (95% CI: 0.55, 0.91) for endometrial cancer, and 0.66 (95% CI: 0.49, 0.90) for ovarian cancer.Conclusions:Data strongly support a decreased risk of breast, ovarian, and endometrial cancers in SLE. This may be due to inherent differences in women in SLE (vs the general population) regarding endogenous oestrogen, other medications, and/or genetic make-up.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 1478-1481 |
| Number of pages | 4 |
| Journal | British Journal of Cancer |
| Volume | 104 |
| Issue number | 9 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Apr 26 2011 |
Funding
Dr Sasha Bernatsky is a Canadian Arthritis Network Scholar and is supported by the Fonds de la Recherche en Santé du Québec (FRSQ) and the McGill University Health Centre Research Institute and Department of Medicine. Dr Clarke is a senior research fellow of the FRSQ.
Keywords
- SLE
- malignancy
- systemic lupus
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Oncology
- Cancer Research
