Daily aspirin could cut cancer deaths in over-50s
According to a review published in the Annals of Oncology on Tuesday (August 5), taking aspirin daily for ten years reduces risk of cancer, heart attacks and strokes.
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A daily dose of aspirin could cut cancer deaths among patients aged 50-plus, researchers have suggested. Taking the antiplatelet for 10 years reduced the risk of cancer, heart attacks and strokes by nine per cent in men and by seven per cent in women aged between 50 and 65, according to a review published in the Annals of Oncology on Tuesday (August 5). Deaths from bowel cancer fell by 40 per cent and deaths from oesophageal and stomach cancers fell by between 35 and 50 per cent, said researchers from Queen Mary University London (QMUL), who led a review of "all the available evidence" of the preventative use of the drug. There was also "overwhelming evidence" that regular aspirin use reduced cases of colorectal cancer, with different clinical trials showing reductions of 25 per cent and 37 per cent, the researchers said in the review. To "reap the benefits" of aspirin – including a reduced risk of death - people aged between 50 and 65 needed to take a daily dose of between 75 and 100mg for at least five years, QMUL said. No benefits were seen after just three years of treatment, they said. Jack Cuzick, head of QMUL's centre for cancer prevention, said the review showed that the total number of deaths for everyone aged 50 to 65 would fall by around four per cent over 20 years if they all took a daily dose of aspirin for at least 10 years. "While there are some serious side effects that can't be ignored, taking aspirin daily looks to be the most important thing we can do to reduce cancer after stopping smoking and reducing obesity, and will probably be much easier to implement," Professor Cuzick said.
Taking higher doses of aspirin did not produce extra benefits and increased the risk of adverse effects such as internal bleeding, especially in older patients, the researchers said. The risks of taking aspirin roughly doubled for every decade of age, and the researchers suggested restricting the preventative use of aspirin to patients under the age of 70.
Identifying individuals with a high risk of bleeding - for example smokers - and either denying them the same treatment or lowering their risk of bleeding was one way to reduce the potential harm of long-term aspirin use, they said.
Although the balance of benefits and harm for the long-term use of the drug appeared "favourable", the authors suggested that more studies of aspirin use for more than 10 years were needed to determine the upper age limit that patients could experience benefits and the optimum dose for cancer prevention.
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