Reuters reported that, according to a study published online in BMJ, the diabetes medication Actos (pioglitazone) may be linked to an increased risk of bladder cancer.
HealthDay reported that investigators “collected data on nearly 116,000 people treated for diabetes from 1988 to 2009 and listed in the General Practice Research Database, which contains records from more than 600 medical offices in the United Kingdom.”
MedPage Today added that “patients with type 2 diabetes who were ever treated with pioglitazone had an 83% higher risk for bladder cancer (adjusted rate ratio 1.83, 95% CI 1.10 to 3.05) than those who had never used the thiazolidinedione.” The investigators reported that “this was a drug-specific effect, because patients taking rosiglitazone (Avandia) did not have an elevated risk (RR 1.14, 95% CI 0.78 to 1.68).” The findings from “this analysis differed from those of a study being presented this week at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, which suggested that the bladder cancer risk was a class effect for glitazones.”
From the American Association for Justice news release.
