OBJECTIVES: Workplace absenteeism may contribute to financial burden faced by women with breast cancer or cervical cancer.  We examined relationships between paid leave and unpaid leave and having debt due to cancer in women with breast cancer or cervical cancer. METHODS: Data from the 2011 Medicare Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS) Experiences with Cancer Survivorship Supplement linked to MEPS Household Component data was used for all analyses.  Inclusion criteria were a self-reported diagnosis of breast cancer or cervical cancer and having worked for pay since cancer diagnosis.  Logistic regression was used to assess associations between binary predictor variables "Paid leave" and "Unpaid leave," and the binary response variable, "Debt due to cancer."  Age, marital status and type of cancer were included as covariates.  An a priori alpha of 0.05 was used for all analyses. RESULTS: The sample included 105 women with ages ranging from 25 years to 85 years with a mean ± standard deviation age of 57.31 ± 11.37 years.   Among the sample, 46% (95% C.I., 34.11 - 53.42) of respondents had taken paid leave, and 70% (58.71 - 77.55) had taken unpaid leave for cancer.  For every unit year increase in age, respondents were 0.91 times less likely to have debt due to cancer, odds ratio=0.91 (95% C.I., 0.86 - 0.96), p=0.001.  Marital status, odds ratio=0.40 (95% C.I., 0.09 - 1.73), p=0.348, and paid leave, odds ratio=1.67 (95% C.I., 0.55 - 5.03), p=0.364, were not significantly related to having debt due to cancer.  However, respondents with unpaid leave were 3 times more likely to have debt due to cancer compared to respondents without unpaid leave, odd ratio=3.03 (95% C.I.,1.11 - 9.09), p=0.043.   CONCLUSIONS: Women with breast cancer or cervical cancer who had taken unpaid leave for cancer were significantly more likely to have debt due to cancer.