NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - The occurrence of breast cancer is lower among women who have had infertility problems because of an ovulation disorder than among women who have not had difficulty conceiving, according to findings from a study involving more than 116,000 women.
Dr. Kathryn L. Terry of Harvard School of Public Health, Boston and colleagues evaluated data from the Nurses' Health Study II, which enrolled female nurses aged 25 to 42 years at baseline.
Information on infertility and ovulation was assessed every 2 years starting in 1989, and cases of breast cancer were included through 2001.
During follow-up, 1357 cases of invasive breast cancer were diagnosed, the investigators report in the Archives of Internal Medicine. Overall, women who had ovulatory disorders had a 25 percent lower likelihood of developing breast cancer than those who did not.
Moreover, the risk of breast cancer was lowest in women who underwent induced ovulation for treatment of infertility.
"Our findings are reassuring since many women and their clinicians are concerned about the long-term implications of infertility treatment," Dr. Terry told Reuters Health.
"However, it is difficult to tease apart the true effect of infertility drugs and infertility, since women who have the most difficultly getting pregnant will most likely be taking infertility drugs the longest," she added.
SOURCE: Archives of Internal Medicine, December 11/25, 2006.
The large study reviewed here found a 25% lower risk of breast cancer in women who have had fertility problems compared to women who didn't have fertility problems. It's not clear if this difference in risk is because of hormonal differences or other factors.
This research offers reassurance that infertility treatments do NOT increase breast cancer risk.
Because infertility treatments generally involve hormones, it's reasonable to wonder whether they might increase breast cancer risk. In this study, women who received infertility treatments had the lowest likelihood of developing breast cancer. It's important to note that the results don't mean that infertility drugs help lower breast cancer risk. It may be that the women who received infertility drugs also had the biggest fertility problems and it was the fertility problems that reduced the risk.
RESOLVE is an organization devoted to providing education and support to individuals with fertility problems. RESOLVE is headquartered in Somerville, Massachusetts, with 50 local chapters in the United States. For information, go to go to www.resolve.org or call 888-623-0744.
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