Can aspirin protect against cancer?

The other day, a fit 50-year-old man came to me for a visit to review his health. As we discussed his (generally good) efforts to take care of himself, he said, “I’ve been wondering if I should take an aspirin every day. I read somewhere that it can prevent cancer.” As a clinician, I really love it when people come in with questions that stretch my thinking. I have a stock set of answers to the “does aspirin prevent heart disease” question, but I didn’t have an easy answer to the cancer prevention question. What were the data? What should I be recommending? Is it true for everyone? Or maybe just for some people? I turned to a respected source of information: the United States Preventive Services Task Force. This group of volunteer medical experts can be convened by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality to review the evidence about many topics in preventive care and give recommendations about various practices, depending on their interpretation of the research. For example, counselling someone to stop using tobacco is a Grade A recommendation — that is, the task force feels there is good evidence that the benefit of such an action is substantial. I reviewed the recent clinical guidelines on this topic and found out that, well, the cancer/aspirin question is a complicated one. Here is what I learned: There are no good data that aspirin will prevent cancers other than colon cancer. While that evidence may be forthcoming, we don’t have it yet. Aspirin ca...
Source: New Harvard Health Information - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Cancer Drugs and Supplements Health Heart Health Prevention Source Type: news