Risk of acute pancreatitis in users of finasteride: a population-based case-control study.
OBJECTIVE
To examine the risk of acute pancreatitis in > or = 60-year-old male users of finasteride in a case-control study from a population of 490,000 persons in North Jutland County, Denmark, from 1993 to 2000.


METHODS
We identified all men age 60 and over with incident acute pancreatitis from the County Hospital Discharge Registry in North Jutland, 1993 to 2000, and selected 10 age-matched controls per case from the Danish Civil Registration System based on incidence density sampling. All prescriptions for finasteride within 90 days prior to admission with acute pancreatitis were identified from the population-based North Jutland Prescription Database. Data on potential confounding factors were also extracted from registries. We used conditional logistic regression to estimate the relative risk of acute pancreatitis, adjusted for these potential confounders.


RESULTS
There were 302 men age 60 and older with incident acute pancreatitis, of whom 3 were exposed to finasteride, and 2994 controls, of whom 37 were exposed to finasteride. The crude odds ratio for having reimbursed prescriptions for finasteride was 0.8 (95% confidence interval, 0.2-2.6). After adjustment for alcohol-related diseases, gallstone disease, hyperlipidemia, hypercalcemia, and hyperparathyroidism, the odds ratio was slightly decreased to 0.5 (95% confidence interval, 0.1-2.5).


CONCLUSIONS
We did not find any increased risk of acute pancreatitis in users of finasteride.
Floyd
Andrea
A
Department of Clinical Epidemiology, Aarhus University Hospitals, DK-9000 Aalborg, Denmark. alfo@sci.au.dk
Pedersen
Lars
L
Nielsen
Gunnar Lauge
GL
Thorlacius-Ussing
Ole
O
Sørensen
Henrik Toft
HT
D058891:5-alpha Reductase Inhibitors; D000208:Acute Disease; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D003718:Denmark / Q000453:epidemiology; D004791:Enzyme Inhibitors / Q000009:adverse effects*; D018120:Finasteride / Q000009:adverse effects*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010195:Pancreatitis / Q000453:epidemiology*; D012306:Risk
D058891:5-alpha Reductase Inhibitors; D004791:Enzyme Inhibitors; D018120:Finasteride