Decision support networks of women newly diagnosed with breast cancer.

Abstract

157 Background: Prior studies suggest that women often involve a network of family and friends in their cancer treatment decision making, yet very little is known about the size and characteristics of these decision support networks and whether their involvement leads to high-quality breast cancer treatment decisions. Methods: A weighted random sample of patients newly diagnosed with breast cancer in 2014-15 as reported to the Georgia and Los Angeles SEER registries were surveyed approximately 6 months after diagnosis (N = 2,502, 70% response rate). Network size was estimated by asking women to list up to 3 of the most important decision support people (DSP) who helped them make their locoregional therapy decisions. Decision deliberation was measured using 4-items assessing degree to which patients thought through the decision, with higher scores reflecting more deliberative breast cancer treatment decisions. We compared the size of the network (0-3+ people) across patient-level characteristics and estimated the adjusted mean deliberation scores across levels of network size using multivariable linear regression. Results: Of the 2,502 women included in this analysis, 51% reported having at least 3 DSPs, 20% reported 2, 18% reported 1, and 10% reported not having any DSPs. Among women who were not partnered (N = 961), 51% had 3 DSPs, 18% had 2, 16% had 1 and 16% had 0 DSPs. Of the DSPs that the respondents identified, the majority were children (30%), followed by partners/spouses (23%), friends (15%), siblings (10%), other family members (6%), and parents (5%). Married/partnered women (p < 0.001), those younger than 45 years old (p < 0.001), those with more than 1 comorbidity (p < 0.001), and black women (p = 0.02) were all more likely to report larger networks on average. Larger support networks were associated with more deliberative surgical decisions (p < 0.001). Conclusions: In this population-based sample, the majority of women engaged DSPs in their treatment decision making and for non-partnered patients, DSPs still played a key role in decision making. Larger size decision support networks were associated with higher quality decisions, underscoring the importance of efforts to identify and engage DSPs in the breast cancer decision making process.