Author Identifier (ORCID)
Abstract
Our study investigated the association between incident cardiovascular disease (CVD) and subsequent cancer risk in two large European prospective cohorts. We included 568,926 adults from the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition and United Kingdom Biobank, all of whom were free of CVD, cancer and type 2 diabetes at baseline. Multivariable Cox proportional hazards regression models were used to estimate cancer hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) in relation to incident CVD events. CVD was treated as a time-varying exposure, and models accounted for time since CVD diagnosis and other lifestyle factors. Study-specific estimates were pooled using meta-analysis. Over a median follow-up of 10.9 years, 51,559 participants developed cancer, including 2344 with a prior CVD diagnosis. In men and women combined, CVD was associated with a higher risk of cancer within the first year after diagnosis of CVD (hazard ration [HR] = 1.65, 95% CI: 1.46–1.86), but not between 1 and 5 years (HR = 1.05, 95% CI: 0.94–1.19) or after 5 years of CVD diagnosis (HR = 1.01, 95% CI: 0.93–1.09). Results were consistent across both cohorts. In sex-specific analyses, CVD was associated with an increased cancer risk 1–5 years post-diagnosis in women (HR = 1.13, 95% CI: 1.06–1.21), while in men, no such association was observed (HR = 1.02, 95% CI: 0.90–1.16). Men with a newly diagnosed CVD had a higher cancer risk within the first year of CVD, likely due to overdiagnosis, but no association was observed beyond 1 year. In women, a diagnosis of CVD was associated with an increased risk of cancer for up to 5 years post-diagnosis, suggesting that cancer overdiagnosis is less likely. These findings should be interpreted given the lack of CVD medication data.
Keywords
cancer, cardiovascular diseases, detection bias, overdiagnosis
Document Type
Journal Article
Date of Publication
9-1-2026
ISSN
00207136
Volume
159
Issue
5
PubMed ID
42132299
Publication Title
International Journal of Cancer
Publisher
Wiley
School
Nutrition and Health Innovation Research Institute / School of Medical and Health Sciences
Funding Information
This work was supported by the French National Cancer Institute (l'Institut National du Cancer) [INCa_18624, ‘ILIAD’]. The coordination of EPIC-Europe is financially supported by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) and also by the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health, Imperial College London, which has additional infrastructure support provided by the NIHR Imperial Biomedical Research Centre (BRC).
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
First Page
1139
Last Page
1152
Recommended Citation
Fontvieille, E., Viallon, V., Peruchet‐Noray, L., Gan, Q., Onland‐Moret, N. C., Koop, Y., Tjønneland, A., Bondonno, N. P., Katzke, V., Kaaks, R., Schulze, M. B., Schiborn, C., Saieva, C., Simeon, V., Agnoli, C., Tumino, R., Ricceri, F., Luján‐Barroso, L., Sánchez, M., . . . Ferrari, P. (2026). Cardiovascular disease incidence and cancer risk in two large European prospective cohorts. International Journal of Cancer, 159(5), 1139–1152. https://doi.org/10.1002/ijc.70458