Diabetics twice as likely to develop cancer, suggests new study

Sunday, May 15, 2011 by: Jonathan Benson, staff writer
Tags: diabetics, cancer, health news

(NaturalNews) A new study published in the journal Diabetes Care reveals that diabetics have a nearly doubled risk of developing certain types of cancer compared to those without the disease. Dr. Chaoyang Li from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta, Ga., and his colleagues found that 16 percent of diabetic men and 17 percent of diabetic women develop cancer, while only seven and ten percent of the general population, respectively, develop it.

"The significant association between cancer and diabetes does not surprise us," Dr. Li is quoted as saying in a recent FOX News piece. Dr. Li and his team surveyed 400,000 adults by phone, and after accounting for external factors like age, race, and smoking and drinking habits, they determined that diabetics are far more prone to develop colon, pancreas, rectum, urinary bladder, kidney, breast and prostate cancers, than is the rest of the population.

The report explains that the most dramatic increase is seen in those with pancreatic cancer, as diabetic men appear to be 400 percent more likely to develop the cancer than others. And in women, those with diabetes tended to be up to three times more likely to develop blood cancer than women without the disease.

"[The study] shows there's a substantial pool of American adults who have diabetes and cancer," said Dr. Fred Brancati, a professor at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Md., who was not involved with the study. "The authors rightly point out that these two conditions go together beyond chance alone, so it pays to think about them together."

Research Dr. Brancati published in 2008 revealed that the death rate from cancer is about 40 percent higher in diabetics than it is in the general population as well, illustrating once again a clear connection between diabetes and compounded cancer risk.

Sources for this story include:

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2011/05/13/peo...