Treatment for prostate cancer using hormone-suppressing therapy may increase the risk of depression, according to recent findings.
The latest study, conducted at the Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, involved data from more than 78,000 men older than 65 being treated for early stage prostate cancer in the United States.
After analyzing data, senior investigator Dr. Paul Nguyen, the head of prostate brachytherapy at Brigham and Women's Hospital, and his team found that 7 percent of patients given testosterone-suppressing therapy and 5 percent of patients not given the hormone-suppressing therapy went on to develop clinical depression in the next few years.
While the latest findings do not prove that testosterone-suppressing therapy causes depression, they do offer substantial evidence that it can increase the risk of mental health issues, according to Nguyen.
Nguyen and his team noted that the findings held true even after accounting for other factors associated with clinical depression like age, educational background and severity of prostate cancer.
What's more, study results revealed that the risk of developing depression among prostate cancer patients grew higher the longer they were on the testosterone-suppressing treatment.
The study linked six or fewer months of testosterone-suppressing therapy with a 12 percent increased risk of developing clinical depression, seven to 11 months of therapy was linked to a 26 percent increased risk of developing clinical depression and a year or more of therapy to a 37 increased risk of developing clinical depression.
"Pharmacologic androgen deprivation therapy increased the risk of depression and inpatient psychiatric treatment in this large study of elderly men with localized prostate cancer. This risk increased with longer duration of androgen deprivation therapy. The possible psychiatric effects of androgen deprivation therapy should be recognized by physicians and discussed with patients before initiating treatment," wrote the researchers.
"What I like about this study is that it's large, and it puts a number on the risk," said Dr. Mayer Fishman, a medical oncologist at Moffitt Cancer Center who was not part of the research.
"If we understand that depression is a risk, we can talk about it with patients and they can anticipate it," he said. "Men, especially older men, are pretty good at not showing their feelings. So this is a wake-up call for them to speak up. They don't have to suffer in silence."
"You have to know what the potential upside is," Nguyen explained. "For some guys it will still be worth it, but for some not."
The latest findings were published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.
