Testosterone therapy and the risk of atrial fibrillation, venous thromboembolism and cardiovascular events in cis men with hypogonadism and trans men

Abstract

Objective: While the cardiovascular safety of testosterone therapy in men remains controversial, limited data exist for trans men treated with testosterone. We assessed cardiovascular events, mortality, and suicide attempts under testosterone therapy in both cis men with hypogonadism and trans men.

Methods: Participants were recruited from the TriNetX Research network. We compared 117 908 cis men with hypogonadism treated with testosterone with 1:1 propensity score matched cis men not treated. We compared 6251 trans men treated with 6251 trans men not treated with testosterone and 6986 trans men treated to 6986 cis men not treated with testosterone.

Results: After 5 years of follow-up, cis men with testosterone therapy had a lower risk of myocardial infarction (HR [hazard ratio]: 0.94, 95% confidence interval [CI] [0.89-0.99], P = .01) with no difference for stroke or mortality, but higher risks of atrial fibrillation (1.27 [1.22-1.32], P < .0001) and acute pulmonary embolism/deep vein thrombosis (1.26 [1.18-1.34], P < .0001). Trans men treated with testosterone had no significant increase in the rate of cardiovascular outcomes as compared to both untreated trans and cis men. There was a lower rate of suicide attempts for trans men treated with testosterone as compared to untreated trans men (0.52 [0.35-0.78], P = .001), without significant differences when compared to untreated cis men.

Conclusions: Testosterone treatment in cis men with hypogonadism was associated with a lower risk of myocardial infarction but a higher risk of atrial fibrillation and venous thromboembolism. Testosterone therapy in trans men was not associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular events when compared to untreated trans men or cis men.

Keywords: atrial fibrillation; cardiovascular disease; suicide; testosterone; thromboembolism; transgender; venous.