Homepage – Forum › Forums › Research, Clinical Trials, and New Treatments › Women experience more severe side effects than men from cancer treatments
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February 14, 2022 at 3:06 pm #42559JoeParticipant
Sex Differences in Risk of Severe Adverse Events (AE) in Patients Receiving Immunotherapy, Targeted Therapy, or Chemotherapy in Cancer Clinical Trials – An American Society of Clinical Oncology Journal
Conclusion
The greater severity of both symptomatic AEs and hematologic AEs in women across multiple treatment modalities indicates that broad-based sex differences exist. This could be due to differences in AE reported, pharmacogenomics of drug metabolism/disposition, total dose received, and/or adherence to therapy. Particularly large sex differences were observed for patients receiving immunotherapy, suggesting that studying AEs from these agents is a priority.Link to the report
ascopubs.org/doi/full/10.1200/JCO.21.02377best
February 15, 2022 at 7:34 pm #42563marysueParticipantHi Joe:
I’ve often wondered if women had more issues with BCG immunotherapy than men. I certainly had a wide gamut of them. One thing that some women experience like I did, is an increase in menopause symptoms. I was just starting into menopause with all the bit with hot flashes and night sweats when I was diagnosed. The BCG made that much worse but I was unable to have any treatment for the menopause because it would have conflicted with the BCG so I just rode it out. It was not fun waking up every couple of hours literally soaked in sweat and having to change my PJs. I would also go through several towels a night and change my sheets nearly every day. It definitely increased my fatigue with all the interrupted sleep.
February 15, 2022 at 8:20 pm #42564JoeParticipantHi Marysue,
Thanks for sharing your experience and pointing our about Intravesical BCG treatment for non-muscle invasive bladder cancer.
Initially, I was surprised to see the article as I never thought that any treatment will make any significant difference unless it is affected by testosterone or estrogens. But the authors of the study includes SWOG (formerly the Southwest Oncology Group) -a National Cancer Institute (NCI) supported organization that conducts clinical trials in adult cancers, University of British Columbia, and etc. Incidentally, SWOG was involved in the development for the original protocol of Intravesical BCG treatment which includes 6 weeks induction course and 3 years of maintenance course, so I figure the data must be credible as the study involved multiple credible institutions. Yes, the study was for mainly systemic treatment. With your input, I have found an article which may answer your question. The authors includes Queens University – the home of Dr. Alvaro Morales who invented BCG therapy for bladder cancer, UBC, Harvard Medical, MD Andersons, and even Institut Pasteur, Paris – the institute where scientists came up with BCG as vaccine for tuberculosis. So, I think the paper is credible. I cannot access detail data but yes, the study indicates sex seems make difference in intravesical BCG treatment, provided I read the paper correctly. The conclusion of the study and the link to the study are shown below.
Conclusion
Among proposed tumor/host intrinsic factors that may influence response to immune-based therapies, patient sex remains a challenging consideration that deserves further attention. Evidence to date supports a multifactorial origin of sexual dimorphism in the incidence and outcomes of UCB.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2588931120301401?dgcid=rss_sd_all
- This reply was modified 2 years, 8 months ago by Joe.
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