ORLANDO, FL, USA (UroToday.com) - Dr. Celestia Higano and colleagues presented their abstract on non-fatal cardiovascular (CV) events in men with CV disease enrolled in CS37, a prospective randomized trial comparing intermittent vs continuous degarelix vs leuprolide in patients with biochemically recurrent prostate cancer.
While it is known that androgen deprivation therapy is associated with increased risk of cardiovascular events, prior pooled analyses showed that patients treated with degarelix were at a lower risk of CV events and death vs those treated with LHRH agonists.
CS37 included 175 patients treated with intermittent degarelix, 50 with continuous degarelix, and 178 treated with continuous leuprolide. CV events were retrospectively reviewed at 1 year.
The authors found that 35% of patients had CV disease at baseline. Median age (75 vs 73 in degarelix vs leuprolide) and BMI (28 vs 30) were similar. Sixty-four percent of those on degarelix vs 52% on leuprolide had Gleason 7-10 disease. Analysis of CV risk factors showed that more degarelix patients had hypertension (35% vs 27%), diabetes (80% vs 71%), and hypercholesterolemia requiring statin use (76% vs 65%). 3.4% of patients on degarelix vs 14.5% of those on leuprolide experienced a CV event over the study period (HR=0.22, CI=0.05-1.03, p=0.054).
The authors concluded that among men with preexisting CVD in CS37, there was a lower risk for subsequent CV events in men treated with degarelix vs leuprolide. This finding supports consideration of CV risk factors when choosing a drug for androgen deprivation.
Presented by Celestia S. Higano, MD, FACP at the 2015 Genitourinary Cancers Symposium - "Integrating Biology Into Patient-Centric Care" - February 26 - 28, 2015 - Rosen Shingle Creek - Orlando, Florida USA
University of Washington, Seattle, WA USA
Reported by Nikhil Waingankar, MD, medical writer for UroToday.com