A pituitary hormone called follicle stimulating hormone (FSH) aids in controlling the homeostasis of testosterone. The precise effect of FSH levels on the risk of prostate cancer (PC) diagnosis was mainly unclear, even though it was widely established that FSH levels rise with LHRH-agonist treatment for PC. For a study, researchers sought to analyze data at the population level to determine if FSH levels and PC diagnoses are related.
Between 1999 and 2018, all men (n=386,018) with a pre-PC diagnostic FSH level and full data were located in the Veterans Affairs Health System. Utilizing stratified Cox proportional hazards models, the relationship between FSH level and the interval between the FSH test and PC diagnosis was investigated. Age, year, race, body mass index, and Charlson comorbidity index were taken into account while creating multivariable models. Time to PC was modeled in two different ways due to nonproportional dangers with passing time: less than or around 4 years after an FSH test and more than 4 years after an FSH test.
The initial FSH level’s median age was 64 years (interquartile range [IQR]: 54-72), the median year of the FSH was 2010 (IQR: 2005–2014), and 70% of the cohort was white. In addition, 17,519 males (4.5%) had PC at the end of a median follow-up of 76 months (IQR: 38-126), throughout which time. In the first 4 years following the FSH test, there was no correlation between the FSH and the time to PC diagnosis on multivariable analysis. On multivariable analysis, starting 4 years after the FSH test, a greater FSH level was associated with a decreased risk of PC with continuous modeling, but no connection was detected with log continuous or categorical modeling.
The relationships between FSH levels and PC risk were inconsistent in the population-level analysis of male veterans obtaining an FSH test for an unidentified clinical rationale, and they were probably caused by selection bias and confounding factors. Future research should take diverse study designs into account.
Reference: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/pros.24429
