Personal networks and perception of care

During the past decade there has been a growing research interest in the effects of social support, characterized by social relationships and affiliation, on health. As health management is largely a social process, social networks have been theorized to impact health outcomes. We find however, an important gap in the literature. Little attention has been given to how the social structure and social position impact cancer care experience. The National Cancer Patient Experience survey 2010 is used to demonstrate how network data can be extracted for the purpose of studying the impact of social network properties on perception of care. The results show that there is a significant difference in network properties (density, betweenness, degree, closeness, efficiency, constraint) of patients who were treated as a whole person or as a cancer symptom. We believe that social networks can help in improving the future service quality for cancer patients.