Impact of pregnancy on breast cancer

Women diagnosed with breast cancer within 12 months after pregnancy are 48 percent more likely to die than other young women with breast cancer, according to a survey by the University of Western Australia.

However, in a study of 3,000 breast cancer patients younger than 45 years, found that if the cancer is diagnosed during pregnancy, your risk of death was only a three percent higher than non-pregnant women with cancer.

Research Assistant Professor Angela Ives at UWA Cancer and Palliative Care Research and Evaluation has shown that very little is known about gestational breast cancer (cancer diagnosed during pregnancy or even a year later.)

“We decided to learn more to enable women to make informed decisions about your cancer treatment and pregnancy,” he said. With his colleagues, Associate Professor / Professor Yves analyzed statistics from Western Australia’s data link system – one of the few such systems in the world.

“The whole system collects data from population-based hospital morbidity, birth and death, cancer registries and notices regarding midwives since 1980. In this case, we were able to identify all cancer cases Gestational breast cancer diagnosed in WA and all other cases of breast cancer in older women and to identify what is different from them.

“We know that pregnancy and lactation reduces the long-term risk of a woman developing breast cancer, but we also know that in the short term, after having been pregnant may increase the risk of developing breast cancer. It is for research about what might occur in tumor cells grow and the role played by the body’s immune response. ”

The researchers, who presented their findings at the European Cancer Conference in Barcelona, is also studying the cumulative effect on the survival of pregnancy and lactation at conception date of cancer diagnosis.