But there is a slightly increased risk of less serious cardiovascular issues
FRIDAY, April 22, 2016 (HealthDay News) — Treatment with aromatase inhibitors doesn’t raise the risk of the most fatal cardiovascular disease events among breast cancer survivors, according to research published online April 21 in JAMA Oncology.
The new study included 13,273 postmenopausal women. The women were diagnosed between 1991 and 2010 with either progesterone or estrogen receptor-positive breast cancer. The women’s health was followed through 2011. In this study, 28.6 percent of the women took aromatase inhibitors, 31.7 percent took tamoxifen, 20.2 percent took both drugs, and 19.4 percent didn’t take either drug.
The researchers found that women who took aromatase inhibitors didn’t have a higher risk for cardiac ischemia and stroke than those who took tamoxifen. But, women who took only aromatase inhibitors or used them after tamoxifen treatment had up to a 29 percent higher risk of other cardiovascular disease (dysrhythmia, valvular dysfunction, and pericarditis) than those who took only tamoxifen.
“Our study is a comprehensive assessment of the impact aromatase inhibitors have on cardiovascular risk and provides reassurance that the hormone therapy to reduce breast cancer recurrence does not increase risk of the most fatal cardiovascular events,” study author Reina Haque, M.D., a research scientist at Kaiser Permanente’s Southern California Department of Research and Evaluation, said in a Kaiser news release.
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