Cardiovascular characteristics of patients initially diagnosed breast cancer

OBJECTIVE: We aimed to explore the cardiovascular characteristics of patients who were initially diagnosed with breast cancer. METHODS: A total of 600 patients who were diagnosed with primary breast cancer were included in this retrospective study. The data of fasting blood glucose, total cholesterol, total triglyceride, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, lipoprotein (a) (LP (a)) and serum uric acid were collected. Univariate analysis was used to evaluate the cardiovascular risk factors (CVRFs) in patients with breast cancer. The arteriosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD) risk assessment was performed. Multivariate analysis was used to identify the factors that influenced axillary lymph node metastasis (ALNM). RESULTS: Compared with the premenopausal group, the prevalence of overweight/obesity (47.6% vs. 35.2%), diabetes (12.8% vs. 4.3%) and hypertension (49.7% vs. 26.3%) were significantly increased in the postmenopausal group (p < 0.05). Comparisons of rural patients and urban patients showed that there were significant differences in the diagnostic age (49.94 ± 9.92 vs. 52.59 ± 11.13) in the rural patients was notably younger in comparison with the urban patients (p < 0.05). However, the number of menopausal patients (44.3% vs. 53.3%) in the rural group were decreased in comparison with the urban group (p < 0.05). In ASCVD risk stratification, the proportion of low-risk patients (56.4% vs. 90.8%), medium-risk patients (20.6% vs 0.3%) and high-risk patients (19.3% vs. 6.6%) were significantly different between the postmenopausal group and premenopausal group (p < 0.05). Residence (OR 0.735; 95% CI 0.516–1.046; p = 0.087), the number of children (OR 1.250; 95% CI 0.990–1.578; p = 0.061) and LP (a) of ≥ 500 mg/L (OR 0.603; 95% CI 0.342–1.063; p = 0.080) were independent influencing factors of ALNM. CONCLUSION: Postmenopausal patients have more CVRFs and higher risks of ASCVD than premenopausal patients initially diagnosed with breast cancer. There was a correlation between CVRFs and ALNM in patients with breast cancer.