Risk of Malignancy in Patients with Asthma‐COPD Overlap Compared to Patients with COPD without Asthma

Barbara Bonnesen, Pradeesh Sivapalan, Alexander Jordan, Johannes Wirenfeldt Pedersen, Christina Marisa Bergsøe, Josefin Eklöf, Louise Lindhardt Toennesen, Sidse Graff Jensen, Matiullah Naqibullah, Zaigham Saghir, Jens Ulrik Stæhr Jensen*

*Corresponding author for this work

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Abstract

Chronic inflammation such as asthma may lead to higher risks of malignancy, which may be inhibited by anti‐inflammatory medicine such as inhaled corticosteroids (ICS). The aim of this study was to evaluate if patients with asthma‐Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) overlap have a higher risk of malignancy than patients with COPD without asthma, and, secondarily, if inhaled corticosteroids modify such a risk in a nationwide multi‐center retrospective cohort study of Danish COPD‐outpatients with or without asthma. Patients with asthma‐COPD overlap were propensity score matched (PSM) 1:2 to patients with COPD without asthma. The endpoint was cancer diagnosis within 2 years. Patients were stratified depending on prior malignancy within 5 years. ICS was explored as a possible risk modifier. We included 50,897 outpatients with COPD; 88% without prior malignancy and 20% with asthma. In the PSM cohorts, 26,003 patients without prior malignancy and 3331 patients with prior malignancy were analyzed. There was no association between asthma‐COPD overlap and cancer with hazard ratio (HR) = 0.92, CI = 0.78–1.08, p = 0.31 (no prior malignancy) and HR = 1.04, CI = 0.85–1.26, and p = 0.74 (prior malignancy) as compared to patients with COPD without asthma. ICS did not seem to modify the risk of cancer. In conclusion, in our study, asthma‐COPD overlap was not associated with an increased risk of cancer events.

Original languageEnglish
Article number1463
JournalBiomedicines
Volume10
Issue number7
ISSN2227-9059
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2022

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.

Keywords

  • asthma
  • asthma‐COPD overlap
  • cancer
  • Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease
  • COPD
  • ICS
  • inhaled corticosteroids

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