Low testosterone may up death risk in male vets
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In a study of male veterans, low blood levels of the male hormone testosterone appeared to increase the risk of death in the next few years by 88 percent.
In an earlier study, Dr. Molly M. Shores from the University of Washington in Seattle and colleagues had shown an increase in 6-month mortality among men with low testosterone levels. The goal of the present study was to examine this association in a larger group of men with up to 8 years of follow-up.
The study involved 858 male veterans who were at least 40 years of age, prostate cancer-free, and had repeated testosterone levels taken between October 1, 1994 and December 31, 1999.
The subjects included 166 with repeatedly low testosterone levels, 240 with an equal number of low and normal levels, and 452 with consistently normal levels. They were followed through 2002, for an average of 4.3 years.
The mortality rate in the normal testosterone group was roughly 20 percent, which is lower than the roughly 25 percent and 35 percent rates noted in the equivocal and low testosterone groups, respectively.
On “multivariate analysis,” adjusting for age, comorbidities, and other factors, only a consistently low testosterone level was associated with a significantly increased risk of death. This held true even after minimizing the effect of acute illness by excluding men who died within the first year of the study.
“The persistence of elevated mortality risk after excluding early deaths suggests that the association between low testosterone levels and mortality is not simply due to acute illness,” the authors conclude.
Still, “large prospective studies are needed to clarify the association between low testosterone levels and mortality.”
SOURCE: Archives of Internal Medicine August 14/28, 2006.
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