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Abstract Background Individuals with psychiatric disorders (PD) have a high prevalence of tobacco use. Patients with PD also potentially receive substandard care in comparison to the general population. Previous research has shown that individuals with PD have a decreased risk of receiving a tobacco related (TR) cancer diagnosis. To further assess this trend, this study assesses the survival of patients with a TR cancer with or without a PD. Materials and methods Our study utilized multiple databases, with methods described elsewhere,6 to identify people in British Columbia that have been diagnosed with psychiatric disorders and appendicitis (our control group). From these groups, we selected individuals who also had a TR cancer. We subsequently extracted information pertaining to these patients from these databases. Results Thirty-nine thousand eight hundred forty-one patients with cancer were included in our study. Analyses of these patients were controlled for by age, gender, cancer type and diagnosis year. This analysis displayed shorter survival time among patients who were diagnosed with depression (HR = 1.16; p = 0.01; 95% CI: 1.04–1.29), schizophrenia (HR = 1.62; p

Background: Individuals with psychiatric disorders (PD) have a high prevalence of tobacco use. Therefore, we assessed the hazard of receiving a tobacco-related (TR) cancer diagnosis among individuals with PD. Methods: Several population-based provincial databases were used to identify individuals in BC diagnosed with depression, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, anxiety disorders, or multiple PD between 1990 and 2013. A primary population proxy comparison group (appendicitis) was also identified and matched to the psychiatric cohort based on age at cohort entry, gender, year of cohort entry, and postal code. We linked individuals in the cohort and comparison groups with the BC Cancer Registry. Using a competing risks approach, we estimated the effect of having a PD on the risk of receiving a TR cancer diagnosis, in light of the competing risk of mortality. Results: In total, 165,289 patients were included. Individuals with depression (HR = 0.81; p < 0.01; 95% CI: 0.73–0.91), anxiety disorders (HR = 0.84; p = 0.02; 95% CI: 0.73–0.97), or multiple PD (HR = 0.74; p < 0.01; 95% CI: 0.66–0.83) had a statistically significant lower risk of a TR cancer diagnosis compared to the comparison group. Individuals with schizophrenia (HR = 0.86; p = 0.40; 95% CI: 0.62–1.21) or bipolar disorder (HR = 0.58; p = 0.12; 95% CI: 0.29–1.14), however, showed no evidence of a statistically significant difference from the comparison group. Interpretation: We found that individuals with depression, anxiety disorders, or multiple PD diagnoses had a significantly reduced risk of receiving a tobacco-related cancer diagnosis. These results were unexpected and could be explained by individuals with a PD having barriers to a cancer diagnosis rather than a true decreased incidence.