Heart Rate, Pulse Pressure Independently Predict Cancer Mortality

WESTPORT, CT Aug 17, 2001 (Reuters Health) - Results from a French study suggest that heart rate and pulse pressure are independent predictors of cancer mortality.

Dr. Athanase Benetos and colleagues, from Centre d"Investigations Preventives et Cliniques in Paris, studied 125,513 men between the ages of 20 and 95 years who had a health checkup between 1978 and 1988.

Compared with the risk ratio for men whose resting heart rate was <60 beats per minute, the risk ratio for cancer mortality was a significant 18% to 33% higher in men with a higher heart rate. After excluding the first 2 years of followup, a significant association was observed between heart rate and all-cause cancer mortality, bronchopulmonary cancer mortality, digestive cancer mortality and cardiovascular mortality (p > 0.01 for all).

The investigators report in the July issue of the Journal of Clinical Epidemiology that, similarly, the risk ratio for cancer mortality was a significant 14% to 23% higher in men with a pulse pressure of 50 mm Hg or greater than in men with a lower pulse pressure. Significant associations of pulse pressure with bronchopulmonary cancer mortality and cardiovascular mortality were observed after exclusion of the first 2 years of followup.

"These associations were examined after taking into account physical activity, cigarette smoking, alcohol consumption and other confounding factors or underlying disease," the researchers explain. Although a causal relationship cannot be deduced from this study, one of the hypotheses they present is that hemodynamic factors may modulate tumor vascularization and thus influence the evolution of cancer.

SOURCE:

• Journal of Clinical Epidemiology  2001;54:735-740.