Cancer Therapy-Induced Cardiotoxicity: Results of the Analysis of the UK DEFINE Database

The accelerated development of novel cancer therapies necessitates a thorough understanding of the associated cardiotoxicity profiles, due to their significant implications for the long-term health and quality of life of cancer survivors.

The aim of this study was to determine the association between cardiotoxicity and non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) treatments using a hospital medicines usage database in England.

An observational study based on a retrospective design using real-world data from the UK DEFINE database was performed. Monthly secondary data of 40 shortlisted drugs from April 2017 to July 2022 were extracted.

The cardiology drug that was associated with most oncology drugs was apixaban. Atezolizumab, bevacizumab, nintedanib, osimertinib, paclitaxel, pembrolizumab, gemcitabine and vincristine were all mostly associated with apixaban, which indicated association with atrial fibrillation. Afatinib, erlotinib and methotrexate were mostly associated with atenolol, hence suggesting the association with ischaemia or hypertension. Docetaxel and epirubicin were associated with verapamil, which indicated association with arrhythmia or hypertension.

From the correlation and regression analyses, it can be concluded that hypertension was the most associated cardiovascular disease with the 20 shortlisted oncology drugs. The findings of this study have provided a better understanding of the association between each NSCLC-Cardio drug pair.