MedWire News: Men whose partners have breast cancer are at increased risk for requiring hospitalization for severe mood disorders, study findings indicate.

This may be due to increased stress and a lack of social support, say Naoki Nakaya (Danish Cancer Society, Copenhagen, Denmark) and colleagues.

"A few small studies have suggested that major psychosocial problems develop in the partners of cancer patients; however, no studies have addressed their risk for severe depression," the researcher note.

Nakaya and team therefore investigated the risk for hospitalization with an affective disorder, including major depression, bipolar disease, and other serious mood-altering conditions, among the male partners of women with breast cancer.

The 1,162,596 men included in the study were 30 years or older at study entry, had no history of hospitalization for an affective disorder, and had lived continuously with the same partner for at least 5 years.

The researchers report that during the 13 years of follow-up, breast cancer was diagnosed in the partners of 20,538 men. One hundred and eighty of these men were hospitalized with an affective disorder.

Multivariable analyses revealed that men whose partners were diagnosed with breast cancer were 39% more likely to be hospitalized with an affective disorder compared with men whose partners did not develop breast cancer.

The risk for hospitalization for an affective disorder increased with increasing breast cancer severity. Specifically, the risk was 30% higher among men whose partners had one positive lymph node at diagnosis and 85% higher among men whose partners had four or more positive lymph nodes, compared with men whose partners did not have breast cancer.

Furthermore, men whose partners died from breast cancer had a significant 3.6-fold increase in risk for an affective disorder compared with men whose partners survived breast cancer.

Writing in the journal Cancer, Nakaya and co-authors conclude that a diagnosis of breast cancer "not only affects the life of the patient but may also seriously affect the partner."

They suggest that screening the partners of breast cancer patients for depressive symptoms might be important for preventing "this devastating consequence of cancer."

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