ReviewExperimental diabetes research2012
Insulin resistance and cancer risk: an overview of the pathogenetic mechanisms.
Review in Experimental diabetes research, 2012. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 307 papers, 13 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
307 citing papers in PubMed, 13 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 611 citations in OpenAlex.
- Overweight and obesity increase breast cancer risk in postmenopausal women: a meta-analysis of 38 observational studies.GeroScience · 2026Pooled it
- Association between prediabetes and thyroid cancer risk: A meta-analysis.Biomolecules & biomedicine · 2025Pooled it
- Linking Hyperuricemia to Cancer: Emerging Evidence on Risk and Progression.Current oncology reports · 2025Pooled it
- Diagnostic performance of the triglyceride-glucose index in predicting occurrence of cancer: a meta-analysis.Frontiers in oncology · 2025Pooled it
- Using multi-omics to explore the genetic causal relationship between colorectal cancer and heart failure in gastrointestinal tumors.Frontiers in immunology · 2024Pooled it
- The crucial role and mechanism of insulin resistance in metabolic disease.Frontiers in endocrinology · 2023Pooled it
- The Role of Circulating Protein and Metabolite Biomarkers in the Development of Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma (PDAC): A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.Cancer epidemiology, biomarkers & prevention : a publication of the American Association for Cancer Research, cosponsored by the American Society of Preventive Oncology · 2022Pooled it
- The Prognostic Role of Glycemia in Patients With Pancreatic Carcinoma: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Frontiers in oncology · 2022Pooled it
- Metformin and thyroid carcinoma incidence and prognosis: A systematic review and meta-analysis.PloS one · 2022Pooled it
- Association of High Dietary Acid Load With the Risk of Cancer: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Observational Studies.Frontiers in nutrition · 2022Pooled it
- Investigation on factors associated with ovarian cancer: an umbrella review of systematic review and meta-analyses.Journal of ovarian research · 2021Pooled it
- Consumption of red meat and processed meat and cancer incidence: a systematic review and meta-analysis of prospective studies.European journal of epidemiology · 2021Pooled it
- Diabetes Mellitus and Obesity as Risk Factors for Bladder Cancer Prognosis: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Frontiers in endocrinology · 2021Pooled it
- Trial
- A Novel Inflammation and Insulin Resistance Related Indicator to Predict the Survival of Patients With Cancer.Frontiers in endocrinology · 2022Trial
- Insulin Resistance and Hepatocellular Carcinoma Development in Chronic Hepatitis B Patients Under Antiviral Therapy.Journal of Korean medical science · 2026Observational
- Association between serum preptin levels and bone metastasis in newly diagnosed prostate cancer: a prospective exploratory study.Journal of bone oncology · 2026Article
- Adipose Tissue Heterogeneity: Depot-Specific Location and Functional Specialization in Obesity-Related Disease.International journal of molecular sciences · 2026Review
- Mechanistic Links Between Obesity and Breast Cancer Progression: Cellular Crosstalk, Metabolic Reprogramming and Microenvironmental Drivers.Cell biochemistry and function · 2026Review
- Association of METS-IR with breast cancer risk: a large-scale retrospective cohort study of Korean women.BMC public health · 2026Article
247 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
9 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Insulin resistance is common in individuals with obesity or type 2 diabetes (T2D), in which circulating insulin levels are frequently increased. Recent epidemiological and clinical evidence points to a link between insulin resistance and cancer. The mechanisms for this association are unknown, but hyperinsulinaemia (a hallmark of insulin resistance) and the increase in bioavailable insulin-like growth factor I (IGF-I) appear to have a role in tumor initiation and progression in insulin-resistant patients. Insulin and IGF-I inhibit the hepatic synthesis of sex-hormone binding globulin (SHBG), whereas both hormones stimulate the ovarian synthesis of sex steroids, whose effects, in breast epithelium and endometrium, can promote cellular proliferation and inhibit apoptosis. Furthermore, an increased risk of cancer among insulin-resistant patients can be due to overproduction of reactive oxygen species (ROS) that can damage DNA contributing to mutagenesis and carcinogenesis. On the other hand, it is possible that the abundance of inflammatory cells in adipose tissue of obese and diabetic patients may promote systemic inflammation which can result in a protumorigenic environment. Here, we summarize recent progress on insulin resistance and cancer, focusing on various implicated mechanisms that have been described recently, and discuss how these mechanisms may contribute to cancer initiation and progression.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.