Under One Roof: Household Composition and Health-Related Quality of Life Among Cancer Survivors.

The majority of cancer survivors in the study resided in single-adult or two-adult households, with a small proportion living with children.

• Total sample included 138,360 adult cancer survivors from the BRFSS 2017–2024.
• 45.2% (n=62,605) resided in single-adult households.
• 47.1% (n=65,132) resided in two-adult households.
• 7.7% (n=10,623) resided in households with ≥3 adults.
• Children were present in only 5.1% (n=7,063) of households.

Two-adult household residence was associated with lower prevalence of poor physical health compared with single-adult household residence.

• Poor physical health was defined as ≥14 days/month of poor physical health.
• Adjusted prevalence ratio (aPR) for poor physical health was 0.93 (95% CI 0.87–0.99, p≤0.019) for two-adult vs. single-adult households.
• Analysis used multivariable Poisson regression adjusting for sociodemographic factors.
• Residence with ≥3 adults was not significantly associated with poor physical health after adjustment.

Two-adult household residence was associated with lower prevalence of poor mental health compared with single-adult household residence.

• Poor mental health was defined as ≥14 days/month of poor mental health.
• aPR for poor mental health was 0.90 (95% CI 0.82–0.98, p≤0.019) for two-adult vs. single-adult households.
• Residence with ≥3 adults was not significantly associated with poor mental health after adjustment.
• Presence of children in the household was not significantly associated with poor mental health after adjustment.

Two-adult household residence was associated with lower prevalence of fair/poor general health compared with single-adult household residence.

• aPR for fair/poor general health was 0.92 (95% CI 0.88–0.97, p≤0.019) for two-adult vs. single-adult households.
• All three HRQoL outcomes (poor physical health, poor mental health, fair/poor general health) were statistically significant at p≤0.019.
• Residence with ≥3 adults was not significantly associated with fair/poor general health after adjustment.

Residence with ≥3 adults and presence of children in the household were not associated with any examined HRQoL outcome after multivariable adjustment.

• Outcomes examined included poor physical health, poor mental health, and fair/poor general health.
• Child presence was defined as ≥1 child in the household vs. none.
• These null associations were found after adjustment in the full analytic sample.
• Exploratory stratified analyses did identify associations within several sociodemographic subgroups, though the abstract does not detail specific subgroup findings.

The study used data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) spanning 2017–2024 and employed multivariable Poisson regression.

• Participants were adult cancer survivors aged ≥18 years.
• Household composition was categorized by number of adults (1, 2, or ≥3) and presence of children (none vs. ≥1).
• Adjusted prevalence ratios (aPRs) with 95% confidence intervals were the primary statistical estimates.
• BRFSS is a nationally representative U.S. surveillance system, supporting generalizability to U.S. cancer survivors.

Single-adult household status was identified as a potential simple social risk marker to inform survivorship assessment.

• Two-adult household residence was consistently associated with better HRQoL across all three outcomes.
• The authors suggest single-adult household status 'may represent a simple social risk marker to inform survivorship assessment.'
• The finding highlights household composition as a potentially actionable social determinant of health among cancer survivors.