HERO On line Working Paper Series
No 2003:3:
Children, family and cancer survival in Norway
Øystein Kravdal ()
Abstract: Models for all-cause mortality among 45000 men and women
with cancer in 12 different sites were estimated, using register and census
data for complete Norwegian birth cohorts. This observed-survival method
seemed to be an adequate approach. The results support the idea that women
who were pregnant shortly before a breast cancer diagnosis may have a
poorer prognosis than others. In principle, such an effect may also reflect
that these women have a young child during the follow-up period, and are
burdened by that. However, this social explanation can hardly be very
important, given the absence of a corresponding significant effect in men
and for other cancer sites in women. Breast cancer is different from other
malignancies also with respect to the effect of parenthood more generally,
regardless of the timing of the pregnancies. On the whole, male and female
cancer patients with children experience a lower mortality than the
childless, although without a special advantage associated with adult
children. This suggests a social effect, perhaps operating through a link
between parenthood, life style and general health. No parity effect was
seen for breast cancer, however, which may signal that the social effect is
set off against an adverse physiological effect of motherhood for this
particular cancer. Among men, both marriage and parenthood were associated
with a good prognosis. Married male cancer patients with children had a
mortality 1/3 lower than that among the childless and never-married. Women
who had never married did not have the same disadvantage.
Keywords: Cancer; Census; Children; Family; Marriage; Register; Social; Survival; (follow links to similar papers)
JEL-Codes: J11; J12; (follow links to similar papers)
24 pages, June 21, 2009
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