Aspirin May Extend Survival for Colon Cancer Patients

Aspirin's benefits have long been touted, and now it appears that we can add another one to the list. A new study in the New England Journal of Medicine reports that aspirin can help prolong the lives of colon cancer patients - specifically, patients whose tumors had a mutated form of the PIK3CA gene.

Of the patients with the mutated gene who took aspirin, 97 percent were alive five years after receiving their colon cancer diagnosis. Only 76 percent of those with the mutation who didn't take aspirin were alive.

Colon cancer is the third leading cause of cancer-related deaths in the United States when men and women are considered separately. When they are grouped together, it is the second leading cause of cancer deaths.

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