Severe distress common in cancer survivors

By Megan Rauscher

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Long-term survivors of adult cancers are significantly more likely than adults in the general population to have psychological distress severe enough to cause moderate to serious problems functioning in social, work or school situations.

Dr. Karen Hoffman, a radiation oncologist at the Harvard Radiation Oncology Program in Boston, presented her group's survey findings Tuesday at the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology's 50th Annual Meeting.

"We hope that our study will raise awareness of the fact that long-term cancer survivors are at increased risk for experiencing psychosocial distress and we hope that this will encourage physicians to evaluate their (cancer) patients for psychological distress either through simple questions or more formal screening that can be incorporated into the clinic visit," Hoffman told the conference.

Using date from the 2002-2006 National Health Interview Survey, she and her colleagues identified 4712 adults who survived for 5 years or longer after their initial cancer diagnosis and 126,841 people who had never had cancer.

Among cancer survivors, the average age at diagnosis was 47 years old and the average age at the time of the survey interview was 62 years. The majority were survivors of breast, gynecologic, male genitourinary and colorectal cancer.

Severe psychological distress was higher among the long-term cancer survivors, at 5.6 percent, compared with 3.0 percent among individuals who were never diagnosed with cancer, which was a statistically significant difference.

"One in 18 long-term cancer survivors reported severe psychological distress, and long-term cancer survivors were almost twice as likely to report stress as those individuals never diagnosed with cancer," Hoffman reported.

Long-term cancer survivors younger than age 65 years were more likely to experience severe psychological distress than were older survivors. Other factors associated with distress were other illnesses, not living with a spouse or partner, lower education level, lack of insurance and smoking.

Dr. Louis Harrison of Beth Israel Medical Center, New York, who moderated a press briefing where the findings were released, noted that psychological distress in cancer survivors is an "under-appreciated issue."