More and more women within the early stages of breast cancer are undergoing double mastectomy procedures in an attempt to nip the cancer at the bud. However, experts are saying that this procedure has not been linked to a decreased risk of death compared to radiation and breast conserving therapy.
This new report is not the first of its kind as there have already been previous research studies conducted on the benefits of having bilateral mastectomy, or the removal of both breasts for patients with breast cancer. In fact, just last year, medical news today had reported on studies that we're claiming that double mastectomy are unnecessary for most of the women affected with the disease.
For this latest study, researchers took into consideration previous data indicating that patients read early-stage breast cancer have a near similar survival rate whether they choose to undergo mastectomy or radiation therapy. This points to the fact that, at this stage, it does not make a significant difference if the patient elects to have both breasts removed. In spite of this, other studies indicate that there still is an increasing number of women who still choose to undergo double mastectomy.
By analyzing data from nearly 200,000 women on the California Cancer Registry, researchers were able to establish that double mastectomy procedures have increased drastically from 2% of patients in 1998 to over 12% of them in 2011, with the procedure most widely utilized by women aged 40 and below. In contrast, the removal of one breast for unilateral mastectomy has declined over the same period. Research lead, Dr. Alison Kurian from the Stanford University School of Medicine, said that their team was able to deduct that performing double mastectomy did not lower risk of death than if the patient chose to undergo breast conserving therapy coupled with radiation. However, they did note that, unilateral mastectomy is associated to higher mortality.