SynthesisBMC psychiatry2025
Parental mental illness and the risk of offspring cancer in childhood: a pooled meta-analysis of English and Swedish national cohorts.
Synthesis in BMC psychiatry, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
9 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundParental mental illness’ effects on risk of childhood cancers is largely unknown. This study determined the association between maternal or paternal mental illness and risk of childhood cancers.
methodsRetrospective cohort studies and meta-analysis using population-based registers from England and Sweden. 591,092 children born 1996–2017 (England) and 2,192,476 children born 1991–2011 (Sweden) were linked to their mothers (both countries) and fathers (Sweden), followed until latest December 2016 (Sweden) or July 2017 (England). Parental mental illness (depression/anxiety, psychosis, alcohol/substance use disorders, eating/personality disorders) were identified through primary (England) or secondary care (Sweden) databases as time-varying exposure, measured from one year before birth until the end of follow-up. Childhood cancer were identified from secondary care data. Hazard ratios (HRs) were estimated using Cox models separately in both countries, adjusted for potential confounders. Random-effects meta-analyses were used to estimate the association for maternal exposure.
resultsAll estimates were characterised by uncertainty, with 95% confidence intervals including scenarios where there was no association. The point estimate represented an increased risk of childhood cancer associated with maternal alcohol or substance use disorders; however, the 95% confidence interval narrowly crosses the null, therefore, this cannot be inferred with certainty (pooled HR 1.30, 95% CI 0.97–1.75). Conversely, point estimates suggest a decreased risk of childhood cancer associated with maternal psychosis (HR 0.76, 95% CI 0.53–1.09) and paternal depression/anxiety (HR 0.85, 95% CI 0.71–1.02); however, these confidence intervals also cross one, so a null effect—or even a small increased risk—cannot be fully ruled out.
conclusionsThere was some tentative evidence of an association between parental mental illness and childhood cancer; however, the uncertainty in the estimates precludes strong conclusions. Further data may clarify these associations.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.