Increased cancer-specific mortality in individuals developing mental disorders after cancer diagnosis: biomedical factors versus psychosocial support

The role of mental health is gaining greater prominence in outcomes research; and increasingly, recent studies are investigating cancer-related outcomes (1,2), including cancer screening, stage at diagnosis, receipt of treatment, and survival, in the presence of comorbid mental conditions. Prior studies have documented excess cancer mortality in people with mental illness (3,4). However, most such studies have addressed pre-existing mental illness and how individuals with depression or other psychiatric conditions fare once they develop cancer. Less is known about the impact of mental disorders on cancer outcomes when mental disorders develop after cancer diagnosis.