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Cardiovascular toxicities of systemic treatments of prostate cancer: is oestrogen to the rescue?

Nature Reviews Urology volume 14, page 575 (2017)Cite this article

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We thank Shah and colleagues for their interest in our article (Cardiovascular toxicities of systemic treatments of prostate cancer. Nat. Rev. Urol. 14, 230–243 (2017))1, which raised some important points regarding the administration route for oestrogen therapy for prostate cancer (Cardiovascular toxicities of systemic treatments of prostate cancer: oestrogen to the rescue? Nat. Rev. Urol http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nrurol.2017.126(2017))2.

In our Review1 we analysed the cardiovascular adverse events of all drugs commonly used to treat prostate cancer, including targeted and hormonal therapies that are not approved for use in clinical practice, such as oestrogens. The use of oestrogens is currently not considered as a therapeutic hormonal option by all guidelines for prostate cancer, as noted by Shah and colleagues2. Oestrogens were usually administered by oral route but their use in this form was associated with severe thromboembolic effects owing to procoagulant molecules produced after being metabolized by the liver3. More recently, alternative routes of administration were tested in order to reduce adverse effects and to improve patient compliance.

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References

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  1. Francesca Maines and Orazio Caffo are at the Medical Oncology Department, Antonello Veccia, Santa Chiara Hospital, Largo Medaglie d'Oro, 38100 Trento, Italy.,

    Antonello Veccia, Francesca Maines & Orazio Caffo

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  1. Antonello Veccia
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  2. Francesca Maines
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  3. Orazio Caffo
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Correspondence to Antonello Veccia.

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Competing interests

O.C. has received honoraria from Sanofi Aventis, Astellas and Janssen. The other authors declare no competing interests.

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Veccia, A., Maines, F. & Caffo, O. Cardiovascular toxicities of systemic treatments of prostate cancer: is oestrogen to the rescue?. Nat Rev Urol 14, 575 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrurol.2017.127

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