Causes of death among people living with metastatic cancer

Abstract

Studying survivorship and causes of death in patients with advanced or metastatic cancer remains an important task. We characterize the causes of death among patients with metastatic cancer, across 13 cancer types and 25 non-cancer causes and predict the risk of death after diagnosis from the diagnosed cancer versus other causes (e.g., stroke, heart disease, etc.). Among 1,030,937 US (1992–2019) metastatic cancer survivors, 82.6% of patients (n = 688,529) died due to the diagnosed cancer, while 17.4% (n = 145,006) died of competing causes. Patients with lung, pancreas, esophagus, and stomach tumors are the most likely to die of their metastatic cancer, while those with prostate and breast cancer have the lowest likelihood. The median survival time among patients living with metastases is 10 months; our Fine and Gray competing risk model predicts 1 year survival with area under the receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.754 (95% CI [0.754, 0.754]). Leading non-cancer deaths are heart disease (32.4%), chronic obstructive and pulmonary disease (7.9%), cerebrovascular disease (6.1%), and infection (4.1%).