Anti-inflammatory medications such as aspirin, ibuprofen and naproxen have been linked to decreasing the risk of different types of cancer that are primarily caused by inflammation. The underlying mechanisms that contribute to this reduction or lack thereof have been explored by various studies. Two studies were released this year on the subject. While one study said that aspirin makes no difference to the development or prevention of breast cancer after studying benign biopsies, another study said aspirin may help people with a certain breast cancer gene. Researchers at the Mayo Clinic conducted a survey of women whose biopsies were declared benign between 1992 and 2001 at the clinic. They were asked about all the medications they had consumed, both prior and after the report divulged the growths on their breasts were not cancerous. Researchers also found out all who were diagnosed with breast cancer, even though the first result was negative. "We found that women who reported using ibuprofen or naproxen had an approximately 40% reduction in breast cancer risk, while women who reported using aspirin had no reduction in breast cancer risk," Dr. Amy Degnim, a breast surgical oncologist at Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, explained. "Women who used the drugs more frequently on a regular basis also had greater protection from breast cancer." Mayo Clinic researchers presented the study at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium that was scheduled between Dec.1 and 14 in San Antonio this year. The previous study was published in August 2019 in the American Cancer Society’s journal called Cancer. Researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Gillings School of Global Public Health took a slightly different approach. They tried to figure out if the DNA methylation in 13 different genes held by each person was affected by the intake of aspirin after breast cancer diagnosis. Analysis of 1,266 breast cancer patients was done from the data obtained through the Long Island Breast Cancer Study. All mortality cause had increased by 67 percent for women who had the BRCA1 gene, as well as for women who took aspirin once every week for six weeks prior to diagnosis. Breast cancer-related mortality risks had come down in people with unmethylated BRCA1 and PR genes by 22 to 40 percent in aspirin users. "Future research designed to replicate our findings should include a larger sample size to allow examination of patterns of aspirin use, and an enlarged panel of genes to explore the role of genetic predisposition in driving overall genetic instability on survival after breast cancer diagnosis," the researchers said. Source
