Investigating the association between breast cancer and coronary artery disease: Insights from a national cohort study.

Abstract

e24016 Background: Exploring the risk of coronary artery disease (CAD) in breast cancer patients is important due to the growing number of breast cancer survivors and the intriguing overlap of risk factors between the two conditions. This study aimed to examine the risk of CAD in breast cancer patients using a large dataset from the National Inpatient Sample. Methods: A retrospective cohort analysis was conducted using data from 2016 to 2019. The dataset included 589,940 unweighted cases of breast cancer matched to an equal number of controls, resulting in a total of 2,949,699 weighted cases. The study population comprised adult females aged 18 years and older with either active or previous breast cancer, compared to matched controls without a history of breast cancer. Confounding factors, such as hypertension, diabetes, and other comorbidities, were addressed using propensity score matching and logistic regression. Results: Surprisingly, the results revealed a lower risk of CAD among breast cancer patients. In the unmatched cohort, the odds ratio (OR) for CAD was 0.84 (95% CI: 0.84–0.85). After matching, the adjusted OR was 0.99 (95% CI: 0.98–0.99). Additionally, breast cancer patients exhibited a decreased likelihood of specific CAD events, including ST-elevation myocardial infarction and non-ST-elevation myocardial infarction. Conclusions: The study revealed an unexpected finding of lower risk of CAD in breast cancer patients. The complexity of the relationship between breast cancer and CAD highlights the need for further research. By understanding how breast cancer may mitigate CAD risk can provide valuable insight into developing more personalized treatments for a growing population of survivors.