The implications of neighborhood socioeconomic status on surgical management and mortality in malignant phyllodes patients in the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results program

Background: Neighborhood socioeconomic status has been implicated in breast cancer incidence and mortality. However, there are no studies on the impact of neighborhood socioeconomic status on clinical outcomes or surgical management among patients with phyllodes tumors. The objective of this study is to understand the relationship between neighborhood socioeconomic status, surgical management and disease specific mortality in malignant phyllodes tumor patients in the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results program. Methods: Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results program was queried for malignant phyllodes tumor patients diagnosed between 2000 and 2016. Using the National Cancer Institute census tract-level index for neighborhood socioeconomic status the data were stratified into low neighborhood socioeconomic status, middle neighborhood socioeconomic status, and high neighborhood socioeconomic status. Bivariate intergroup analysis was conducted. Disease specific mortality was evaluated using a Cox proportional hazards model. Results: Of the 651 patients with malignant phyllodes tumor in the sample, the disease specific mortality was 7.6% and 7.9% at 5 and 10 years, respectively. On bivariate analysis, there were no differences between the neighborhood socioeconomic status groups and surgery type (P = .794). On multivariable analysis, older age (≥71 years; hazard ratio 9.9; 95% confidence interval, 2.84–34.57; P < .001) and larger tumor size (≥40 mm; hazard ratio 2.20; 95% confidence interval, 1.09–4.44; P = .027) were associated with a higher disease specific mortality compared with younger age (≤ 40 years) and smaller tumor size (<40 mm). There was no association between neighborhood socioeconomic status and disease specific mortality (low neighborhood socioeconomic status-ref, middle neighborhood socioeconomic status hazard ratio 0.87 (95% confidence interval, 0.71–1.78; P = .71), high hazard ratio 0.91 (95% confidence interval, 0.44–1.90, P = .81). Conclusion: Among malignant phyllodes tumor patients in the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results program, disease specific mortality and surgical management are mostly driven by tumor characteristics and not social determinants of health.