ARBs and Cancer Risk: New Meta-Analysis Raises Questions Again

Medscape - Mar 02, 2022.

The debate on whether the popular class of antihypertensive drugs, angiotensin receptor blockers (ARBs), may be associated with an increased risk for cancer has been reopened with the publication of a new meta-analysis. The analysis found an increasing risk for cancer, and specifically lung cancer, with increasing cumulative exposure to these drugs.

The findings were reported in a study recently published online in PLOS ONE. The author of this new meta-analysis is Ilke Sipahi, MD, a cardiologist from Acibadem University Medical School, Istanbul, Turkey, who previously raised this issue in an initial meta-analysis published in 2010.

"The new meta-analysis is important because it is the first study to investigate whether there is a dose response in the association between ARBs and cancer," Sipahi told theheart.org | Medscape Cardiology.

"I found a clear signal of increased risk of cancer as exposure to ARBs increased, and the association started to become significant when the maximum dose was taken for 3 years," he added.

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