Psychiatric disorders associated with increased risk of colorectal cancer in the UK biobank cohort

Journal article

Psychiatric disorders are associated with several cancers. However, data on the association between different types of psychiatric disorders and colorectal cancer (CRC) are scarce. The aim of this study was to determine whether there is an association between psychiatric disorders and CRC using UK Biobank. We excluded participants with a previous diagnosis of cancer (except non-melanoma skin cancer) prior to baseline and conducted a matched cohort study with new-onset psychiatric disorder patients after recruitment as the exposure group and matched non-psychiatric disorder individuals as the reference group. Through UK Biobank, we obtained clinical diagnoses for the psychiatric-disorder patients from their hospital records. The Cox proportional hazards model was used to estimate the hazard ratios (HRs) of CRC risk after diagnosis of a psychiatric disorder. We identified 29,769 individuals with psychiatric disorders. During follow-up (median duration of 5.69 [IQR: 5.43] years), 190 cases of CRC were identified in the psychiatric patients (1.13 per 1000 person-years), compared with 921 cases in the reference individuals (0.53 per 1000 person-years). Individuals with clinically confirmed psychiatric disorders were associated with an elevated hazard of CRC (HR, 1.93 [95% CI, 1.64–2.27]). The risk of CRC in psychiatric patients is higher in those with multiple psychiatric disorders than single (HR 2.53 [95% CI, 1.90–3.37] vs. 1.78 [95%CI, 1.48–2.13], p < 0.05). Our findings suggest: patients with psychiatric disorders were associated with an elevated hazard of CRC. These findings highlight the need for measures to decrease the risk of CRC in individuals with psychiatric disorders, such as monitoring and early intervention.

Authors: Wang, Z; Zhu, T; Huang, L; Zhang, X; Lv, X

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: Nature Research
• Journal: Scientific Reports
• Volume: 16
• Issue: 1
• Article number: 1597
• Publication date: 2026-01-13
• Acceptance date: 2025-11-28
• DOI: 10.1038/s41598-025-31083-1
• EISSN: 2045-2322
• ISSN: 2045-2322
• Language: English
• Keywords: Psychiatric disorders; Colorectal cancer; Cohort study; UK biobank