Prostate hormone therapy may up diabetes

Men with prostate cancer may have increased risk of developing diabetes if they receive androgen deprivation therapy, a researcher in the Philippines says. Lead author Dr. Maria Luisa Cecilia Rivera-Arkoncel, a fellow at the Philippine General Hospital in Manila, and colleagues say their study compared 38 men with prostate cancer who received hormone therapy that blocks the production or action of male hormones, and 36 men with less advanced prostate cancer who did not receive hormonal therapy. Both groups received treatment at the Philippine General Hospital from 2004 to 2010. The average age of the two groups was not the same at the beginning of the study but the groups were similar in terms of other diabetes risk factors, Rivera-Arkoncel says. Using medical record data, the researchers identified patients with type 2 diabetes or metabolic syndrome. Metabolic syndrome is a cluster of risk factors that increase the risk of diabetes, heart disease or stroke that include a large waistline and low high-density lipoprotein, so-called "good cholesterol or high triglycerides, high blood pressure or high blood sugar. Men who received the hormone therapy had a two-fold increased probability of having diabetes, compared with the non-hormone therapy group, Rivera-Arkoncel says. The study shows the prevalence of diabetes was 42 percent in the hormone therapy group and 19 percent in the control group. In addition, the group receiving the hormone therapy had a higher prevalence of the metabolic syndrome than the other group did. The findings were presented at The Endocrine Society's 93rd annual meeting in Boston.