The young ones

“6,4% OF ALL BREAST CANCERS ARE DIAGNOSED IN WOMEN WHO ARE YOUNG AND FALL UNDER THE SCREENING RADAR.” – Prof Carol Ann Benn

The American Cancer Society (cancer.org) estimates that, in 2016, there were 231 840 new cases of invasive breast cancer in the US, of which 12 150 cases were diagnosed in women under the age of 40 and about 26 393 under the age of 45. The Journal of the American Medical Association ( JAMA) (jama.jamanetwork.com) reports a 3 ,6% increase in the number of women aged 25-39 in the US who were diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer between 2000 and 2009; this seems to be a global trend.

Breast-cancer specialist Prof Carol Ann Benn acknowledges that her unit is seeing more and more young women with breast cancer, as well as more young women with DCIS (ductal carcinoma in situ – the socalled “sleeping cancer”).

“In addition,” she says, “and in line with what’s happening internationally, we’re finding more young women with grade-3 breast cancers (higher grade). But this could be due to them being mistakenly diagnosed with a fibroadenoma – a common benign tumour found in 20 to 30-year-olds – which results in young women presenting with advanced breast cancer. We’re also seeing an increase in the difficult-to-treat triple-negative (oestrogen and progesterone-negative) cancer, as well as breast cancers that are far more aggressive (growing at a significantly faster rate than in older women). And no one is able to explain