Prostate Cancer Treatment Shows No Benefit Against COVID-19

(Reuters) – Small studies have suggested that androgen deprivation therapy (ADT), a common treatment for prostate cancer, might protect COVID-19 patients from becoming seriously ill. A new, larger study found no benefit, according to a report published in JAMA Network Open.

Androgen not only fuels prostate cancer but also regulates a protein that plays a role in COVID-19 infections.

Researchers studied 1,106 COVID-19 patients with prostate cancer, 24% of whom had received androgen deprivation therapy (ADT). Thirty days after COVID-19 diagnosis, there was no difference in COVID-19 severity or death rates between men who did or did undergo ADT.

The result was the same when researchers restricted the analysis to 477 men who were closely matched on the basis of similar health status and risk factors.

“These findings do not support the hypothesis that ADT may be useful” for patients with COVID-19, the researchers concluded.

But this observational study, they point out, cannot definitively prove whether or not ADT reduces COVID-19 severity. The answer to that question will come from large randomized trials that are currently underway.

SOURCE: https://bit.ly/30hX4Ym JAMA Network Open, online November 12, 2021.

Source: Read Full Article