When doctors diagnose cardiovascular disease, their main concern is usually preventing problems such as heart attacks, strokes, and heart failure.
A long-running British study suggests there may be another health risk worth considering as well. Men with cardiovascular disease were more likely than women to develop cancer and die from cancer during decades of follow-up.
The finding comes from research involving 22,534 people whose health was tracked for more than 25 years. Scientists from the University of Aberdeen and Keele University examined whether having cardiovascular disease was related to later cancer outcomes. They paid particular attention to whether those outcomes differed between men and women.
Heart and blood vessel diseases affect millions of people in the UK. Cardiovascular disease is not one single illness but a family of conditions that includes coronary heart disease, heart failure, stroke, atrial fibrillation, and diseases affecting blood vessels. Together, these illnesses are responsible for a large share of deaths and long-term disability.
Cancer is another major cause of death, and researchers have become increasingly interested in the links between the two groups of diseases. A person who develops one may share many of the same risk factors that increase the chance of developing the other.
Smoking is an obvious example because it damages arteries and the heart while also greatly increasing the risk of lung cancer and several other cancers.
Excess body weight, too little exercise, unhealthy eating patterns, and heavy alcohol use may also contribute to both cardiovascular disease and cancer.
Aging is another powerful shared risk because both conditions become more common later in life. Scientists are also investigating whether inflammation, changes in metabolism, and other biological processes could help connect the diseases.
For years, much medical attention has focused on what happens to the heart after a cancer diagnosis. Some cancer medicines and radiation treatments can damage the cardiovascular system, so specialist cardio-oncology services have been developed to reduce those risks.
The researchers behind the new study argue that health care may also need to look in the other direction.
The team used the EPIC-Norfolk database, which contains long-term health information collected as part of the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition.
This type of study is valuable because researchers can follow a large group of people over many years and record who develops particular illnesses. It can reveal patterns that may be difficult to see in smaller or shorter studies.
Professor Phyo Myint from the University of Aberdeen led the research, with researchers including Professor Mamas Mamas from Keele University and Dr. Tiberiu Pana. They compared cancer development and cancer deaths among people with and without cardiovascular disease. They then examined whether the relationships looked different in men and women.
People who had cardiovascular disease experienced more cancer and more cancer-related deaths than those without it. But the researchers found an additional pattern: among people with cardiovascular disease, men had worse cancer outcomes than women. The difference appeared across the cancer types studied.
Some of the strongest differences involved lung and esophageal cancers, while lung and colorectal cancers were important contributors to the increased cancer burden.
These are significant findings because they suggest that sex may need to be considered when researchers investigate the relationship between cardiovascular health and cancer. A single approach to risk assessment may not capture important differences between men and women.
There are several possible explanations, and the study does not establish which one is responsible. Men may have different lifetime exposure to smoking, alcohol, obesity, or other risks, depending on the population and generation studied. Differences in biology, health behavior, screening participation, and how quickly people seek medical help could also influence the results.
The findings therefore should not be interpreted as evidence that cardiovascular disease directly turns into cancer. Heart disease and cancer are separate conditions, and most people with cardiovascular disease will not necessarily develop cancer because of their heart condition.
Instead, cardiovascular disease may act partly as a marker of accumulated health risks that can also make cancer more likely.
This distinction matters when deciding what doctors and patients should do with the information. The study supports stronger attention to risks that can be changed, including smoking, excess weight, inactivity, and harmful alcohol use. Reducing these risks can provide benefits that extend beyond the heart and may also lower the chance of certain cancers.
The research may eventually influence how preventive care is organized. A patient being treated for cardiovascular disease already has regular contact with health professionals, creating opportunities to check whether recommended cancer screening is up to date and to address lifestyle risks.
Men with several risk factors may deserve particular attention, although any additional screening strategy would need to be tested carefully.
The research was published in the European Heart Journal, a major peer-reviewed journal covering cardiovascular medicine. The long follow-up and the ability to compare men and women are major advantages of the study. Following more than 22,000 people for over two decades provides a stronger picture of long-term outcomes than a study lasting only a few years.
There are limitations, however. Because the researchers observed what happened rather than assigning people to different treatments or exposures, the study cannot prove cause and effect. Even careful statistical analysis cannot completely remove the possibility that other differences between participants contributed to the cancer outcomes.
The results also raise questions that future studies need to answer. Researchers need to understand how much of the increased risk comes from smoking and other shared lifestyle factors, how much may come from underlying biology, and whether the findings are similar in populations outside the UK.
It is also important to learn whether changing the way cardiovascular patients are screened or counselled would actually prevent cancer deaths.
The study’s broader message is that diseases do not always fit neatly into separate medical boxes. The same person’s heart health, cancer risk, lifestyle, age, and biology can interact over many years. Recognizing these connections could help doctors move toward prevention strategies that protect several parts of health at the same time.
For patients, the findings are a reason for awareness rather than alarm. Having cardiovascular disease does not mean cancer is certain, and the study does not support unnecessary testing. It does suggest that controlling known risks and taking part in appropriate cancer screening may be especially valuable for men already living with heart or blood vessel disease.
If you care about cancer, please read studies that a low-carb diet could increase overall cancer risk, and vitamin D supplements could strongly reduce cancer death.
For more health information, please see recent studies about how drinking milk affects the risks of heart disease and cancer and results showing higher intake of dairy foods linked to higher prostate cancer risk.
Source: Keele University and the University of Aberdeen.
