Socio-economic inequalities in cancer survival: how do they translate into Number of Life-Years Lost?

BACKGROUND: We aimed to investigate the impact of socio-economic inequalities in cancer survival in England on the Number of Life-Years Lost (NLYL) due to cancer. METHODS: We analysed 1.2 million patients diagnosed with one of the 23 most common cancers (92.3% of all incident cancers in England) between 2010 and 2014. Socio-economic deprivation of patients was based on the income domain of the English Index of Deprivation. We estimated the NLYL due to cancer within 3 years since diagnosis for each cancer and stratified by sex, age and deprivation, using a non-parametric approach. The relative survival framework enables us to disentangle death from cancer and death from other causes without the information on the cause of death. RESULTS: The largest socio-economic inequalities were seen mostly in adults <45 years with poor-prognosis cancers. In this age group, the most deprived patients with lung, pancreatic and oesophageal cancer lost up to 6 additional months within 3 years since diagnosis than the least deprived. For most moderate/good prognosis cancers, the socio-economic inequalities widened with age. CONCLUSIONS: More deprived patients and particularly the young with more lethal cancers, lose systematically more life-years than the less deprived. To reduce these inequalities, cancer policies should systematically encompass the inequities component.