People with diabetes are at increased risk for developing some cancers and are more likely than nondiabetics to die of cancer. Now a study reports that they also have a higher risk of dying in the weeks just after cancer surgery.
The analysis of 15 earlier studies encompassed about 60,000 patients, both with and without diabetes, who underwent surgery for cancers of the colon, esophagus, liver, lung, stomach, pancreas and prostate. It found that the patients with pre-existing diabetes were 50 percent more likely than nondiabetic patients to die within a month of surgery, regardless of the type of cancer.
The patients in the studies had both types of diabetes, though Type 2 is more common.
Their higher death rate may have resulted from problems associated with the chronic illness, like a greater risk of infections and heart disease, said Hsin-Chieh Yeh, assistant professor of medicine and epidemiology at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and an author of the paper, published in the April issue of Diabetes Care.
“The implication of this is that diabetes care is important on top of the cancer care,” Dr. Yeh said. “When patients are diagnosed with cancer, the patient and the family and the physician think, ‘This is serious — we have to take care of the cancer part first.’ And sometimes they forget about the diabetes they have.”
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