Breast-conserving therapy (BCT), which involves limited surgery and radiation, is a suitable option for young women with BRCA-associated breast cancer, the most common hereditary type of the disease, new research suggests. This is because the risk of cancer returning in the same breast after treatment is relatively low.

The optimal treatment of women with hereditary breast cancer remains an unsettled issue, Dr. Mark Robson and colleagues, from Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York, note in the journal Cancer.

To investigate, the researchers followed 87 women with BRCA-related cancer who were treated with BCT between 1992 and 2004. The patients were around 43 years of age when first diagnosed with the cancer. Seventy-four percent of the patients were also treated with chemotherapy and 29 percent also received the anti-cancer agent tamoxifen.

The risk of developing a repeat cancer in the same breast was 11.2 percent at 5 years and 13.6 percent at 10 years.

Robson and his colleagues suggest that “BCT is a reasonable option for these women, and that the” reasons for performing complete breast removal or mastectomy in these patients shouldn’t be any different from those used in women with non-hereditary forms of breast cancer.

SOURCE: Cancer, January 1, 2005.