Risk Factors Affecting Survival Time of Breast Cancer Patients: The Case of Southwest Ethiopia

Abstract

Background: Breast cancer is one of the non-communicable diseases and the main origin of the loss of life in the world. In Ethiopia, breast cancer is the second common cancer health problem for women. The main objective of this study was to identify the potential risk factors affecting the survival time of breast cancer patients in Southwest Ethiopia. Study design: A retrospective study design. Methods: The data were taken from the patients’ medical records that registered from January 1, 2015, to January 31, 2020. A retrospective study design was used in this study. Different shared frailty survival models were employed to analyze the dataset. Results: Out of 642 recorded breast cancer patients, 447(69.6%) cases died during the study period, and 195 (30.4%) patients lost follow-up for unknown reasons. The median time to death for breast cancer patients was 10 months, and hospitals were used as a cluster effect. The result revealed that women with no smoking habit had about 3.35 times higher survival time than patients who had a smoking habit, and as breast cancer patients age increased, the survival time decreased by 0.99. Moreover, breast cancer patients in rural areas had about 0.14 times lower survival time, compared to breast cancer patients who were urban residents. Conclusions: Age, place of residence, treatment taken, stage, histologic grade, tumor size, oral contraceptives, and smoking habits led to a shorter survival time. To reduce the burden of breast cancer, awareness should be given to the community.