Table 2.
Publications of calcium intake with non-skeletal endpoints by study design
| Endpoint | Observational studies | RCTa | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cross-sectional | Case-control | Cohort | Total | ||
| IHD/MI | 1 | 4 | 27 | 31 | 9b |
| Stroke | 1 | 2 | 25 | 27 | 8b |
| Cancer (any site) | 0 | 188 | 112 | 300 | 7c |
| Colorectal cancer | 0 | 49 | 45 | 94 | 3c |
| Breast cancer | 0 | 25 | 25 | 50 | 3c |
| Prostate cancer | 0 | 34 | 32 | 66 | 2c |
| Colorectal adenoma | 3 | 14 | 8 | 25 | 2 |
Abbreviation: IHD/MI ischaemic heart disease or myocardial infarction, RCT randomised controlled trial
aTwo RCTs had colorectal adenoma as the primary endpoint. All other RCTs reported data as secondary endpoints
bUnpublished data for myocardial infarction and stroke from an additional 11 RCTs published in meta-analyses [25, 26]
cUnpublished data for cancer published in a meta-analysis [27] from an additional 6 RCTs for total cancer and colorectal cancer, 4 RCTs for breast cancer, and 2 RCTs for prostate cancer