Social Characteristics and Adherence to Adjuvant Endocrine Therapy in Premenopausal Women With Breast Cancer

PURPOSE Social characteristics, including cohabitation/marital status and socioeconomic position (SEP)—education level, employment status, and income—influence breast cancer prognosis. We investigated the impact of these social characteristics on adherence to adjuvant endocrine therapy (AET) from treatment initiation to 5 years after diagnosis. METHODS We assembled a nationwide, population-based cohort of premenopausal women diagnosed in Denmark with stage I-III, estrogen receptor–positive breast cancer during 2002-2011. We ascertained prediagnostic social characteristics from national registries. AET adherence was based on information from the Danish Breast Cancer Group and operationalized as (1) adherence trajectories (from group-based trajectory modeling) and (2) early discontinuation. We computed odds ratios (ORs) and associated 95% CI to estimate the association of cohabitation and SEP with AET adherence using multinomial and logistic regression models adjusted according to directed acyclic graphs. RESULTS Among 4,353 patients, we identified three adherence trajectories—high adherence (57%), slow decline (36%), and rapid decline (6.9%). Compared with cohabiting women, those living alone had higher ORs of slow (1.26 [95% CI, 1.08 to 1.46]) or rapid decline (1.66 [95% CI, 1.27 to 2.18]) versus high adherence. The corresponding ORs for women not working versus employed women were 1.22 (95% CI, 1.02 to 1.45) and 1.76 (95% CI, 1.30 to 2.38). For early discontinuation (17%), the ORs were 1.48 (95% CI, 1.23 to 1.78) for living alone and 1.44 (95% CI, 1.17 to 1.78) for women not working. CONCLUSION Adherence to AET was lower among women living alone or unemployed than cohabiting or employed women, respectively. These women may benefit from support programs to enhance AET adherence.