fall in br ca cases
fall in br ca cases tinyurl.com/v4bxa Not what we had been led to believe at all- Big Fall in Breast Cancer Cases after women abandon HRT.
Read all about it -dilly
I wonder if abandoning the contraceptive pill would do similar?
No sign of women being encouraged to abandon it to reduce risk of BC. Anyone else outraged by the named women fertility experts that seem to behave as if they speak for all women?
news.independent.co.uk/uk/health_
medical/article2073049.ece
Dr. Samuel Epstein, a professor at the University of Chicago says “The pill is the largest unregulated human trial that’s ever been conducted.
Too right, if I knew what I know now, I’d never have taken it.
I agree with you about the pill.
My Oncologist has told me that my 20 year old daughter should not take the pill for more than 2 years in her life time. She has suspected endometriosis and the pill would probably help her immensely but I don’t want her to risk it. I only took the pill for about 6 months as it didn’t suit me and I still managed to get ER+ and PR+ breast cancer.
Pill and HRT Thanks for the link Dilly. Really interesting article. The research shows pretty dramatic reduction in breast cancer rates in US 2003/2004 after the HRT scare caused lots of women to give up HRT. Apparently 8% decrease in hormone receptor positive cancers but also 4% decrease in hormone negative ones too.
I’m sure that if the contraceptive pill had been designed for men it would have undergone more rigorous tests.
When I was diagnosed the first thing i thought of was the fact that I was on a very early incredibly high oestrogen dose pill(one which was subsquently banned as was another one I took shortly afterwards.) I went on the pill in 1967 and was on various high oestrogen doses for 8-10 years.
Then shortly after I was diagnosed I realised I was triple negative so not so sure the pill made any difference (though some think negative tumours start out positive?) If oestrogen did have anything to do with getting cancer then I think my short menstrual cycle (21-22 days for years) and never having children contributed too.
BUT I don’t regret my years on the pill. (nor never having children.) I was a promiscuous young 60s woman and an unwanted pregancy would have been a disaster. I think we all do at the time what seems OK at the time…the wisdom of hindsight is a fine thing…but it is hindsight. I’ve been a lesbian for 20 plus years so I maybe have more reason than some to ‘regret’ the pill. I don’t.
If I was young and straight in 2007 rather than 1967 I’m not sure whether I would or wouldn’t take the pill. Any thoughts?
Jane
I have advised my daughter not to take the pill but just to add I never took it myself…and yet here I am.
Jane had mast for ER+ and 4 yrs later ER- lumpectomy and loadsa nodes. I read that HER2 pos and neg sometimes switch mysteriously. Maybe the neg drop in cases is due to this. dilly
I know people who’ve never taken the pill and still got breast cancer. Nevertheless, it is now a known risk factor for breast cancer. I took it for 9 years from 1976. In those days, the risk factors always mentioned were risk of strokes and blood clots. If risk of breast cancer was mentioned, it was minimised and glossed over. I don’t think ithe pill agreed with me because I used to get splitting headaches and nausea every few months and these stopped after I stopped taking it. I still put up with it for all those years though (duh!)
Many young women are still prescribed the pill now. I wonder if they and their mothers are given the full facts about the risk of breast cancer or whether it’s still glossed over and whether doctors make out that the benefits of reducing risk of ovarian cancer and unwanted pregnancy outweigh the risk of breast cancer.
That’s a risk/benefit girls and women should decide for themselves, not doctors. I suspect many are not given sufficient information to make an informed decision and I wonder whether, if breast cancer is mentioned, the women are told by medics that it’s not so bad because so many people now survive it. What patronising arrogance if that goes on.
Problem is that it is the timing that counts The most recent research sugges that the pill is much more carcinogenic when taken by someone who has not yet had a child (as are many other things, including cigarette smoke) and that duration of use has no effect on pre-menopausal cancers. One recent study estimated increased risk of pre-menopausal breast cancer is about three times (44% increase) as great for someone who has not had a first full-term pregnancy , to use the technical lingo, as for someone who has already had one (15% increase). For premenopausal women who had their first child more than four years after starting the pill, the risk was 55% greater according to a recent metastudy.
If the clinical trials first tested the pill out in women who had had a few kids and wanted to keep their family size manageable, they could very easily have gotten a figure that grossly underestimated the risk to childless women. Along time ago I read an article about the pill’s inventor that highlighted that he was particularly concerned about the difficulties faced by women who had larger families than they could handle, so it is quite possible that the test group was completely different from who uses the pill today.
Getting the estimated risk right matters a great deal. I was put on the pill because I had such painful ovarian cysts that I found normal life difficult during ovulation. I knew about the breast cancer link, but the packet insert lulled me into a sense of security by saying that the breast cancer risk was offset by a reduced risk of other, more lethal cancers (I think ovarian and endometrial). Since I had not had a child at that time, I wonder if the packet was misleading about the risks I faced and if other options might have been considered if the doctor had known the risk.
I believe that the doctor who did the big statistical analysis showing the variations in the risks of the pill was trying to increase doctor’s awareness that it might not be a good idea for childless women. I think that changing the wording on the packet is essential.
ChristineMH I HOPE your figures for taking pill before having a baby are wrong. Think of how many teenagers are taking the damn thing and planning to go through further education/training, getting up career ladder plus buying 1st home and then having to wait several years before a baby being financially possible- the risk is horrifying- the mind boggles. dilly
It is now acknowledged that taking the pill before you have your first child increases your risk of breast cancer more than taking it after first pregnancy, but I bet young childless women being prescribed it aren’t told that.
The theory is that it is only pregnancy that makes breast tissue mature and be less susceptible to breast cancer. When I asked my breast surgeon whether he thought the pill could have contibuted to my breast cancer, he asked me whether I took it before I had my first child, when I said yes, he confirmed that it could certainly have been a factor.
I have never taken either the contraceptive pill-not ever- and nor HRT.
Yet I was still one of the unlucky ones.
The medics are blaming my exceptionally long term heavy periods.
I think that maybe loads of factors cause the disease; even environmental ones.
Lambkin
Really? Definitely not what most of the media are saying. As giving up HRT due to cancer scares is a fairly recent phenomenon, I’m surprised it has had time to make an impact. But then I’m very cynical about ‘good news’ stories these days.