Last year, I wrote an article on cancer prevention, which received great response. There are also many criticisms, Especially on aspirin, Because some negative research results have been published in the past year, Some people who are shooting behind the scenes are not very idle. To be on the safe side, I took this in the manuscript, Some people request reprinting is also so ordered. In private, people often ask, Whether there has been a change of opinion about aspirin, I have not given a public reply. Because I know there will definitely be positive research results. Indeed, it did. But this time I am not proud. I am Zhuge Liang again. Instead, I discussed it privately with some professionals. Because there have been some clinical studies on aspirin in the past period of time, It’s time to re-examine aspirin. Aspirin has a century-old brand name. Bayer Aspirin. Bayer is a German pharmaceutical factory founded in 1863. Starting from the production of salicylic acid. In 1897, the company’s chemists made heroin while making codeine. The first to make heroin was the British. It was done in 1874, Feeling useless, He threw it away. He realized the addiction of morphine and codeine in 1897. Bayer believes heroin can be used as a substitute to avoid the addiction of morphine drugs. Good idea, but no heroin addiction research has been carried out at all. Put it on the market immediately, It is marketed as a non-addictive morphine drug, cough medicine and drug for treating morphine addiction. Adults cough and eat, Children cough and eat, As soon as it tastes, it can’t stop, Because heroin is more addictive than morphine. This, Bayer has become a drug dealer, The company regretted it, Hurry down to the market, It has become a great disgrace in Bayer’s history. Fortunately, Aspirin was made by Bayer in 1898. As early as ancient Greece, Willow bark powder is used to relieve pain, fever and headache. Beginning in the middle of the 19th century, Chemists began to study salicylic acid. Also in 1897, Bayer chemists have synthesized acetylsalicylic acid, which is more insoluble than salicylic acid. named it aspirin, After the listing, it was a great success. Become Bayer’s most profitable drug, Making Bayer a giant in the pharmaceutical industry. There is a dispute over the right to discover aspirin. Bayer officials said it was invented by Felix Hoffmann. But another argument was invented by Arthur Eichengrun, Because he was Jewish and discriminated against, The credit was deprived. After World War I, The victors plundered Germany’s chemical and pharmaceutical industries, Many assets, patents and trademarks belong to others. An American company bought all Bayer’s assets in the United States at a low price. Including the famous Bayer Aspirin brand, To this day, In the United States, Bayer Aspirin is not produced by Bayer in Germany, It was made by Stirling Company in the United States. Of course, the patent has expired long ago. Aspirin can be produced by anyone, Other brands are also cheaper than Bayer. After aspirin came out, It is mainly used to relieve pain, It is widely used, Until the advent of acetaminophen in 1956, And the advent of ibuprofen in 1969, Aspirin went downhill. It was also during this period that, The mechanism of aspirin has been determined, Its antithrombotic ability was found, Aspirin is starting to look good again. In 1982, Harvard Medical School Begins [Doctor Health Research] Large Epidemiological Tracking, There were 22,071 male doctors participating, To observe the preventive effect of aspirin on heart disease and tumor, The first phase was originally scheduled to end in 1995, But it stopped in 1988 because the effect was too significant. It was found that long-term aspirin use could reduce the risk of men’s first heart attack by 44%, The FDA immediately approved aspirin to prevent heart attacks, It is recommended that people at risk of heart attack take an aspirin every day. After that, large-scale long-term follow-up results showed that Both women and men benefit, It also proves that low-dose aspirin can play the same role. Several other long-term follow-up tests, It also shows that aspirin can prevent cancer, Long-term use of aspirin, After 5 years, the incidence rate of colorectal cancer can be reduced by 37%, After 10 years, it decreased by 74%, After taking it for 3 years, polyps can be reduced by 19% to 35%, But also can reduce the death rate of cancer patients by one-third to half. In addition, it also has certain preventive effects on prostate cancer and breast cancer. Sounds like a magic potion, But aspirin has side effects. It may cause ulcers in the stomach and small intestine. Severe cases will bleed. Rare cases can lead to intracranial hemorrhage. High doses of aspirin will increase the risk of deafness and tinnitus. It will also increase the risk of children suffering from Reyes syndrome. Therefore, aspirin should not be given to children after suffering from influenza and chickenpox. Aspirin should not be taken during pregnancy, especially during the later stages of pregnancy. Because it can increase the risk of bleeding in pregnant women and fetuses. For the middle-aged and elderly people who take aspirin to prevent cardiovascular diseases and tumors, Ulcer bleeding and intracranial bleeding are the most worrying side effects. If you take moderate doses of aspirin, The incidence of this side effect is less than 1%. Taking low doses of aspirin, The incidence of such side effects is likely to decrease, But there is no definite conclusion. The proportion of ulcers may be as high as 10%, But most of them are asymptomatic, Bleeding is mainly seen in people over 70 years old, Since low and moderate doses of aspirin have the same effect, Therefore, it is recommended to take low-dose aspirin. At the same time, take it after breakfast and drink a large cup of hot water to reduce the risk of ulcer. The study also found that people who took aspirin for a long time had twice as many advanced age-related macular degeneration as those in the control group. But there is no difference in early AMD. Another very rare condition is allergy to aspirin. These people are also allergic to non-steroid anti-inflammatory drugs including acetaminophen and ibuprofen. The situation goes through again. One not uncommon phenomenon can be found: Drugs have both advantages and disadvantages, Especially for long-term medication. It’s better to prevent heart disease, Prevention of tumor is fine, The key to taking aspirin for a long time is to weigh its preventive effects against side effects. Not everyone will suffer from heart disease or tumor. Aspirin will not prevent all heart diseases or tumors. The trade-off between the preventive effect provided by aspirin and the possibility of serious side effects after taking aspirin is the basis for deciding whether aspirin should be taken or not. Aspirin prevention of heart diseases has been limited to high-risk groups and heart disease patients. Recently, the heated discussion is that aspirin can be used to prevent tumors. This comes from a paper just published in < >, This long-term follow-up study quantified the advantages and disadvantages of taking aspirin to prevent cancer and cardiovascular diseases in healthy people. If 100 men and 100 women start at the age of 55, Taking aspirin for 10 years in a row, At the age of 75, The following results will appear. Judging from this result, Aspirin’s effect on preventing heart disease in healthy people is less than or equal to its side effects, while its effect on preventing tumors is far greater than its side effects. Men are more significant than women. If men start taking aspirin at the age of 65, they can prevent 4 more tumor deaths than the above data, but the number of cases of severe bleeding increases significantly after the age of 70.
In general, For men between the ages of 50 and 65, After taking aspirin every day for 10 years, It can reduce the death rate of tumors, heart diseases and stroke by 9%, compared with 7% for women. The total death rate has decreased by 4% in 20 years. This is by far the strongest evidence supporting aspirin to prevent cancer. The US Preventive Services Working Group (USPSTF) is evaluating this. Supporters believe that aspirin will be recommended to the elderly to prevent tumors.
Existing studies have confirmed that the preventive effect of aspirin takes 3 years to appear and 5 years to reduce mortality. For this reason, its side effects, especially bleeding, cannot be ignored. This is also why opponents still don’t like aspirin.
There are doubts about the data analysis of this study, and there are many influencing factors in this long-term study. It is not 100% certain whether aspirin really causes it. Only when the effect is more significant can the conclusion be drawn.
Like other similar studies, There is also a possibility that, Aspirin eaters are more health-conscious people, Apart from taking aspirin, Living habits are also healthier than those who do not take aspirin, They also have regular physical examinations, So the chance of dying from the tumor is small, It is not aspirin. Some even think that It is the side effect of aspirin causing gastrointestinal hemorrhage that makes some people seek medical treatment. Results Colon cancer was detected by mistake. Theoretically, aspirin and non-steroid anti-inflammatory drugs are likely to prevent cancer, but whether long-term clinical application can offset the effects of side effects is still inconclusive, including this latest study, and more clinical research data are needed.
One thing is very important, For recommendations for preventive measures, Unless the effect can reach the effect of vaccine, We should be as careful as possible, Because it may give people the illusion that taking aspirin can prevent tumors, ignoring the attention paid to life and eating habits, which are more important in tumor prevention. Even if aspirin can really prevent tumors, it can only prevent a small part and can only be used as one of the means to prevent tumors.
Whether aspirin should be taken or not, the advice of authoritative organizations is to listen to doctors, which is a test for doctors. Due to the high risk of side effects, most doctors in the United States hold a negative attitude towards taking aspirin for a long time from a cautious point of view, so the use of aspirin for cancer prevention will still be in a very small state.