Psychogeriatric Patients Have a Lower Cancer Prevalence Than Nonpsychiatric Geriatric Patients

Autopsy reports of psychogeriatric patients who died in a mental hospital (N = 212) were compared with reports of geriatric patients who died in a general hospital (N = 249). The prevalence of malignancy was found to be 3 times greater in patients that died in a general hospital versus those that had died in a mental institution. The lower cancer rate in psychiatric patients is discussed with respect to neuroleptics, altered hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis activity, and inflammatory cytokines.