- The top three research areas for this month encompass a total of 11 publications on endocrinology, 9 publications on tumors, and 9 publications on the circulatory system. These findings have been published in "Medicine," "Arthritis Research & Therapy," and "Scientific Reports" journals.
- Selected Paper in June：Patients received left breast irradiation have higher risk of heart disease.
Breast cancer patients receiving systemic chemotherapy, targeted therapy or local radiation therapy may cause cardiac damage. Although more advanced radiation therapy technology has greatly reduced the chance of heart damage, long term follow-up studies investigating the probability of various types of heart disease are still relatively lacking.
The team from Dalin and Hualien Tzu Chi Hospital used health insurance claims data from 2000 to 2017 to include approximately 160,000 breast cancer patients. And then used propensity score to match 20,000 left breast and 20,000 right breast cancer patients with similar characteristics for analysis. The result showed that the patients with left breast cancer had a higher risk of heart disease and those with a radiation dose exceeding the certain unit also had a higher risk of heart failure. There was no higher risk of heart disease when taking three main systemic anti-cancer agents.
The research team developed risk stratification, which aids in clinical decision-making reference. Age is the most important risk factor among many risk factors. The authors also remind that they used claims data, so the dose and damage to the heart caused by some radiotherapy cannot be obtained, so it is difficult to explore the relevant mechanisms.
Highlight of JUN (2023) ：This month's primary research focuses on the treatment of cardiovascular diseases, the risk factors associated with rheumatoid arthritis, and diabetes.
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