Colchicine Use and Risk of Cancer in Patients with Gout: A Nationwide Cohort Study

Preclinical studies suggested that colchicine possesses anti-mitotic and anti-inflammatory properties that can inhibit tumor cell proliferation and metastasis across various cancer models.However, real-world evidence on its potential anticancer effect remains limited.To evaluate the association between colchicine use and the risk of cancer in patients with gout compared to non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) use.We utilized claims data from the Korean National Health Insurance Service-National Sample Cohort (2002)(2003)(2004)(2005)(2006)(2007)(2008)(2009)(2010)(2011)(2012)(2013)(2014)(2015)(2016)(2017)(2018)(2019), employing a new-user design.The study population included initiators of colchicine or NSAIDs following a gout diagnosis.A 1:2 propensity score (PS) matching was used to balance potential confounders between two groups.The primary outcome was incident cancer.The hazard ratio (HR) for cancer incidence was estimated using the Cox proportional hazards model.The final matched cohort consisted of 6,296 colchicine users and 12,592 NSAIDs users.The mean age were 50.6 and 50.1 years, and the proportion of male patients were 76.8% and 77.3% in the colchicine and NSAIDs group, respectively.The crude incidence rate (IR) was 9.70 per 1,000 person-years in colchicine users and 9.71 per 1,000 person-years in NSAIDs users.Among PS-matched patients, colchicine use was not associated with a lower risk of cancer compared to NSAIDs use (HR 1.00, 95% CI 0.88-1.14).In this population-based cohort study, colchicine use was not associated with a lower risk of cancer compared to NSAIDs in patients with gout.