ROCHESTER, Minn., Oct. 24 (UPI) -- Mayo Clinic researchers report most women who have a contralateral prophylactic mastectomy are satisfied and would elect that procedure again.
CPM is the removal of an unaffected breast -- in addition to a cancerous breast -- to reduce risk of future breast cancer.
Contralateral prophylactic mastectomy is one option to reduce contralateral risk in women diagnosed with a first breast cancer who also have a strong family history of breast cancer," said Marlene Frost, Mayo Clinic oncology researcher and lead investigator of the study. "Women need to carefully weigh the benefits of this procedure with the potential adverse effects."
More than 211,000 women are diagnosed annually with breast cancer in the United States. The risk of developing breast cancer in the other breast after an initial diagnosis is about 15 percent during a woman's lifetime. That risk increases dramatically to 52 percent in the lifetime of women with an inherited mutation of the BRCA1/2 genes and to 40 percent during the first 10 years for women under 40.
The findings were published online Oct. 3 in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.
