Risk factors, behaviors, and adverse health outcomes of financial toxicity in adult chronic myeloid leukemia survivors: a theory-based structural equation model.

PURPOSE: Patients diagnosed with chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) are at risk of developing financial toxicity (FT) due to the high cost of tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) treatment and other cancer-related costs. This theory-based study evaluated relationships between risk factors, patients' behaviors, FT experience, and health outcomes among survivors of CML.

METHODS

We collected cross-sectional survey data from 129 adults with CML prescribed a TKI from 10/2019 to 01/2024. Instruments included measures of FT, patients' behaviors related to FT (financial sacrifices, non-adherence, and debt or bankruptcy), and health outcomes (psychoneurological symptom cluster severity, health-related quality of life, and distress). Risk factors were collected via a sociodemographic questionnaire and researcher-abstracted medical record data. Structural equation modeling was used to test the adapted theoretical model of FT.

RESULTS

Participants were relatively young (mean ± standard deviation 49.7 ± 15.5, median 51, 19-84 years) and balanced in sex (49% female) and race (43% non-White); median time since diagnosis was 57 months. A higher level of FT was directly associated with adverse health outcomes (standardized coefficient = 0.33, P < .01), with patients' behaviors as mediators (mediating total effects = 0.62, P < .001). Risk factors, including lower education, lower income, non-private insurance, and being a racial minority, were positively associated with higher levels of FT (standardized coefficient = 0.51, P < .001).

CONCLUSIONS

Our findings support hypothesized pathways and help validate the theoretical model that contributes to understanding patients' FT experience. Further investigation is needed to explicate the longitudinal nature of FT, patients' behaviors, and outcomes to guide better methods of risk assessment and inform intervention development.