Racial Differences in Prostate Cancer Treatment: The Role of Socioeconomic Status

This study examines whether socioeconomic status (SES), measured at both the individual and neighborhood levels, is associated with receipt of definitive treatment for localized prostate cancer and whether these associations mediate racial differences in treatment between non-Hispanic White and non-Hispanic Black men.

The Philadelphia Area Prostate Cancer Access Study (P² Access) is a mailed, cross-sectional survey of men sampled from the Pennsylvania Cancer Registry, combined with neighborhood Census data.

Eight counties in southeastern Pennsylvania.

2,386 men with prostate adenocarcinoma.

Receipt of definitive treatment, race, self-reported income, education, employment status, and neighborhood SES.

Overall, Black and White men were equally likely to receive definitive treatment. Men living in neighborhoods with higher SES were more likely to receive definitive treatment (OR 1.57, 95%CI 1.01, 2.42). Among men who received definitive treatment, Black men were significantly less likely to receive radical prostatectomy compared with White men (OR .71, 95% CI .52, .98), as were men with some college education compared with those with a high school education or less (OR .66, 95% CI .47, .94). SES does not mediate racial differences in receipt of definitive treatment or the type of definitive treatment received, and associations with income or employment status were not significant.

These results stress the importance of examining racial disparities within geographic areas and highlight the unique associations that different measures of SES, particularly neighborhood SES and education, may have with prostate cancer treatment.