Global association of incidence between atrial fibrillation and the major gastrointestinal cancers: An analysis based on the 2019 Global burden of disease study

Abstract

Atrial Fibrillation (AF) and gastrointestinal (GI) cancers are age-related diseases with shared environmental risk factors and underlying biological mechanisms. This study aimed to assess the association between AF and GI cancers on a global scale, analyzing incidence data from 204 countries. This ecological study utilized data from the Global Burden of Disease. Spearman's correlation and logistic regression analyses were employed to assess the association between AF and specific GI cancers, including esophagus cancer (EC), colon and rectum cancer (CRC), liver cancer (LC), pancreatic cancer (PC), and stomach cancer (SC). AF, CRC and PC exhibited increasing crude incidence rates from 2000 to 2019, whereas EC and SC demonstrated decreasing trends specifically in females. From 2000 to 2010, there was a noticeable fall in the incidence rate of LC, which was followed by a minor growth through 2019. The age-standardized incidence rate (ASIR) of AF was positively correlated with CRC and PC, but a negative relationship with AF was revealed for EC. Unexpectedly, no significant relationship was discovered for SC and LC associated with AF. Logistic regression analysis revealed a positive correlation between a country's ASIR of AF and its ASIR of CRC, LC and PC. Conversely, these countries demonstrated a decreased ASIR for EC. Our findings showed a significant correlation between national incidence rates of AF with CRC and PC, worldwide. Countries with higher ASIR of AF had higher ASIR of CRC and PC. Additional research is necessary to confirm the association between GI cancers and AF at the individual level.

Keywords

• Atrial fibrillation
• Gastrointestinal cancers
• Incidence
• Global burden of disease
• Association