• Am. J. Med. Sci. · Sep 2019

    Metformin Associated With Increased Survival in Type 2 Diabetes Patients With Pancreatic Cancer and Lymphoma.

    • Anne Wynn, Albert Vacheron, Jeffrey Zuber, and Solomon S Solomon.
    • Department of Medicine/Endocrinology, Division of Endocrinology, University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Memphis, Tennessee.
    • Am. J. Med. Sci. 2019 Sep 1; 358 (3): 200-203.

    BackgroundThe biguanide drug metformin is one of the most commonly used medications for the treatment of type 2 diabetes mellitus. Diabetics are at an increased risk for cancer. Previous studies have demonstrated improved outcomes in patients taking metformin suffering from prostate, colon, lung, thyroid, and esophageal cancers. Metformin's main antineoplastic mechanism of action is thought to be mediated through inhibition of mammalian target of rapamycin, inhibition of hypoxia-inducible factor 1 (HIF-1) alpha, and activation of p53. We investigated the overall survival of type 2 diabetic patients on metformin with pancreatic cancer and lymphoma using the Computerized Patient Record System at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Memphis TN.MethodsLymphoma and pancreatic cancer patients with type 2 diabetes were sorted into an experimental (metformin) group and a control (nonmetformin) group. Patients were compared on baseline characteristics including race, body mass index, and age. Cancer outcomes including overall survival, metastasis, recurrences, and incidence of new malignancies were recorded. Hemoglobin A1C, creatinine and cancer treatment modalities were recorded and compared. Statistical analyses used included unpaired t tests and Chi-squared tests.ResultsThere was significantly greater overall long-term survival in the metformin group compared to the nonmetformin group for lymphoma (5.89 vs 1.29 years, P < 0.001) and for pancreatic cancer (0.68 vs 0.22 years, P = 0.016). Cancer treatment modalities in both groups were comparable.ConclusionsMetformin is associated with a significant, positive effect of increased overall survival in type 2 diabetes patients with pancreatic cancer and lymphoma. These results are encouraging, and prospective studies should be done to further investigate metformin's effects in cancer.Copyright © 2019 Southern Society for Clinical Investigation. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

      Pubmed     Full text   Copy Citation     Plaintext  

      Add institutional full text...

    Notes

     
    Knowledge, pearl, summary or comment to share?
    300 characters remaining
    help        
    You can also include formatting, links, images and footnotes in your notes
    • Simple formatting can be added to notes, such as *italics*, _underline_ or **bold**.
    • Superscript can be denoted by <sup>text</sup> and subscript <sub>text</sub>.
    • Numbered or bulleted lists can be created using either numbered lines 1. 2. 3., hyphens - or asterisks *.
    • Links can be included with: [my link to pubmed](http://pubmed.com)
    • Images can be included with: ![alt text](https://bestmedicaljournal.com/study_graph.jpg "Image Title Text")
    • For footnotes use [^1](This is a footnote.) inline.
    • Or use an inline reference [^1] to refer to a longer footnote elseweher in the document [^1]: This is a long footnote..

    hide…