Sleep quality and prostate cancer aggressiveness: Results from the REDUCE trial.

Disrupted sleep has been associated with increased risk of certain cancers. Little data exist in prostate cancer. We tested the association between sleep quality and prostate cancer diagnosis overall and by tumor grade in the Reduction by Dutasteride of Prostate Cancer Events chemoprevention trial. We hypothesized that worse sleep quality would be associated with increased tumor aggressiveness.

At baseline, 5614 men completed a validated six-item questionnaire on sleep quality. We generated a composite score categorized into tertiles to measure overall sleep quality and assessed each sleep quality question individually. Logistic regression was used to test associations between baseline sleep quality and overall, low-grade and high-grade prostate cancer diagnosis at 2-year study-mandated biopsy. Models were stratified by nocturia.

Overall sleep quality was unrelated to overall or low-grade prostate cancer. Worse overall sleep quality was associated with elevated odds of high-grade prostate cancer (odds ratio [OR]T3vsT1 1.15; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.83-1.60 and ORT2vsT1 1.39; 95% CI: 1.01-1.92). Men reporting trouble falling asleep at night sometimes vs never had elevated odds of high-grade prostate cancer (OR: 1.51; 95% CI: 1.08-2.09) while trouble staying awake during the day was associated with decreased odds of low-grade prostate cancer (OR: 0.65; 95% CI: 0.49-0.86). Results were similar within strata of nocturia severity.

Overall, associations between sleep quality and prostate cancer were inconsistent. However, there was some evidence for a positive association between insomnia and high-grade prostate cancer, and an inverse relationship between daytime sleepiness and low-grade prostate cancer; findings that should be validated by future studies.

The Prostate. 2020 Aug 24 [Epub ahead of print]

Emily K Wiggins, Taofik Oyekunle, Lauren E Howard, Sarah C Markt, Lorelei A Mucci, Donald L Bliwise, Daniel M Moreira, Gerald L Andriole, Martin L Hopp, Stephen J Freedland, Emma H Allott

Division of Urology, Durham Veterans Affairs Health Care System, Durham, North Carolina., Department of Population and Quantitative Health Sciences, Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, Cleveland, Ohio., Department of Epidemiology, Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts., Department of Neurology, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, Georgia., Department of Urology, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, Illinois., Division of Urologic Surgery, Department of Surgery, Washington University School of Medicine, St Louis, Missouri., Department of Surgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California., Patrick G. Johnston Centre for Cancer Research, Queen's University Belfast, Belfast, UK.