Marriage Is As Protective As Chemotherapy in Cancer Care

What is the price of a happy marriage, a secure family, and a network of well-connected friends within our communities today? Aizer et al1 present noteworthy findingsin the article that accompanies this editorial, which suggest that being single, separated, divorced, or widowed significantlyincreases the risk of oncologic presentation with already metastatic cancer, reduced adherence to state-of-the-art treatment, and greater likelihood of earlier death from this cancer. On the basis of the National Cancer Institute’s SEER Medicare data from 734,889 contemporary Americans (2004 to 2008), these incontrovertible data come from the 10 leading cancers, apply to both men and women, and create profound implications for our models of cancer care.1 Strikingly, the benefits of marriage are comparable to or greater than anticancer treatment with chemotherapy. Mehr