Endometriosis and its treatment with danazol or lupron in relation to ovarian cancer.

Carrie M Cottreau, Roberta B Ness, Francesmary Modugno, Glenn O Allen, Marc T Goodman
Clinical cancer research : an official journal of the American Association for Cancer Research · 2003 · vol. 9(14) , pp. 5142–4 · PMID:14613992 · W2163078849
article OA: closed CC0 ⤵ 42 in-corpus citations
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⚙ AI-generated summary by claude@2026-06, 2026-06-07 ⓘ

This study found that danazol use, but not leuprolide/nafarelin use, was associated with a significantly elevated risk of ovarian cancer in women.

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Abstract

PURPOSE: It has been hypothesized that circulating androgens may be involved in the development of ovarian cancer. The androgenic medication, danazol, and the antiandrogenic medications, leuprolide and nafarelin, are commonly used in the treatment of endometriosis. We assessed the associations between the use of these medications and ovarian cancer. EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN: We pooled information on self-reported use of danazol and leuprolide/nafarelin from two population-based case-control studies of incident ovarian cancer, comprising 1373 cases and 1980 controls. Odds ratios for the association between danazol and ovarian cancer, and leuprolide/nafarelin and ovarian cancer were adjusted for age, parity, oral contraceptive use, and family history of ovarian cancer. These analyses were repeated among the 120 cases and 124 controls who reported having had endometriosis. RESULTS: Danazol users (n = 19) were at a significantly elevated 3.2 fold (95% confidence interval, 1.2-8.5) risk of developing ovarian cancer, whereas leuprolide/nafarelin users (n = 23) were not at significantly elevated risk (odds ratio, 1.0; 95% confidence interval, 0.4-2.4). Similar results were obtained among the subset of women with endometriosis. CONCLUSIONS: Danazol, but not leuprolide/nafarelin, increased the risk of ovarian cancer. This supports the hypothesis that androgen excess may be associated with the development of ovarian cancer.

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Condition tags

endometriosis

MeSH descriptors

Antineoplastic Agents, Hormonal Danazol Endometriosis Estrogen Antagonists Leuprolide Ovarian Neoplasms Adult Aged Antineoplastic Agents, Hormonal Case-Control Studies Danazol Endometriosis Endometriosis Estrogen Antagonists Female Fertility Agents, Female Fertility Agents, Female Genetics, Population Humans Leuprolide

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Cited by (42)

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