Association between dyslipidemia and breast cancer risk: a retrospective case-control study stratified by menopausal...

To investigate the association between dyslipidemia and breast cancer risk in women, aiming to provide insights for prevention and clinical practice.

A retrospective case-control study was conducted on 840 women who underwent breast cancer evaluation from December 2019 to April 2024. Baseline characteristics, lipid profiles (total cholesterol [TC], triglycerides [TG], high-density lipoprotein cholesterol [HDL-C], low-density lipoprotein cholesterol [LDL-C]), and tumor markers were compared between patients with confirmed breast cancer and non-cancer controls. Multivariate logistic regression was used to identify independent risk factors, and receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis assessed the diagnostic performance of lipid indicators.

Patients with breast cancer exhibited significantly higher TC and LDL-C levels than the controls (P<0.05). Elevated TC, TG, and LDL-C showed positive correlation with carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA), carbohydrate antigen 153 (CA153), and carbohydrate antigen 125 (CA125) (P<0.05). HDL-C was negatively correlated with these tumor markers (P<0.05). Independent predictors of breast cancer included age ≥55, nulliparity, premenopausal status, and elevated TC, TG, and LDL-C (P<0.05). ROC curves yielded area under the curve (AUC) values of 0.621 for TC and 0.600 for LDL-C. Subgroup analysis revealed that, in premenopausal women, only elevated TC was associated with breast cancer risk, whereas in postmenopausal women, elevated TC, TG, and LDL-C were significantly associated with the risk.

Elevated blood lipid levels, particularly increased TC and LDL-C, are associated with the occurrence of breast cancer and may serve as auxiliary markers for assessing the risk in high-risk subgroups such as nulliparous and premenopausal women.