Wade Swenson, Professor of Internal Medicine at Anne Burnett Marion School of Medicine at Texas Christian University, shared on LinkedIn:
“New in Supportive Care in Cancer: Loneliness is correlated with cancer mortality in US counties.
We know loneliness affects individual health. Our team at the Rural Cancer Institute asked a different question: does it also function as a community-level marker of cancer outcomes?
We analyzed 1,303 US counties, linking NCI age-adjusted cancer mortality data (2018 to 2022) with County Health Rankings data.
What we found:
- On average, about 1 in 3 adults in these counties reported feeling lonely
- Higher county loneliness was associated with higher all – site cancer mortality
- The association held after adjusting for smoking, education, sleep, flu vaccination, rurality, and other factors
- The full model explained 55% of the variation in county cancer mortality
This is an ecological, cross – sectional study, so it’s hypothesis – generating, not proof that loneliness causes cancer deaths. But it suggests loneliness may capture something about a community’s social environment that our usual measures miss.
One practical takeaway: health systems and public health departments could consider including loneliness in Community Health Needs Assessments.
Proud of this team: Ingrid J. (lead author), Abigail Swenson, Zachary Schroeder, Emily McGovern, DO, and Gillian N..
Read it.”
Other articles featuring Wade Swenson on OncoDaily.