According to an article published in URO Today the belief that adjuvant androgen suppression therapy (AST) is associated with early deaths due to myocardial infarctions (MCIs) is not true.

The belief that ASTs increases deaths from MCIs comes from the TROG 96.01 trial conclusions. Now there has been a retrospective, long term (ten year) meta-analysis which concludes that this conclusion was more likely to have been a chance finding.

This recent long-term follow up actually suggests that there was no increase at all compared to men receiving radiotherapy alone for their prostate cancers.

The 96.01’s successor, the RADAR trial, should be reporting new data with a 5 years follow-up comparing non-fatal and fatal MCIs in 1071 men who have been randomized to either 6 or 18 months of AST, where cardiac data has been collected prospectively alongside other known risk factors for MCI.
These prospective data will clarify the conflicting data we currently have available.

James W. Denham, MD, FRANZCR as part of Beyond the Abstract on UroToday.com.

JOEL T NOWAK, M.A., M.S.W