A Large Epidemiological Study Confirms Actos/Bladder Cancer Link

Page Changed:Actos and Avandia: Dangerous Diabetes Drugs
Text Updated: Actos Is Proven to be Associated with A Higher Rate of Bladder Cancer
On Sept 17, 2010, the FDA announced that it was conducting a safety review of Actos, because prelimnary (5 year) results from a 10 year study found "...there was an increased risk of bladder cancer in patients with the longest exposure to Actos and in those with the highest cumulative dose of the drug.

In June of 2011 the FDA confirmed FDA confirmed that there was a heightened risk of bladder cancer with Actos. Years later, in May of 2016 a study published in the high impact British Medical Journal, which studied the records of 145,806 patients again concluded that "Piaglitazone [Actos] is associted with an increased risk of bladder cancer." This association was only true for Actos, not Avandia, suggesting something about the drug itself, not the class of drugs, was at fault.

Pioglitazone use and risk of bladder cancer: population based cohort study. Marco Tuccori, et al.
BMJ 2016; 352 doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmj.i1541. However, doctors can still prescribe Actos.