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Åke Borg

Åke Borg

Principal investigator

Åke Borg

Reproductive factors and risk of contralateral breast cancer by BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutation status: results from the WECARE study

Author

  • Jenny N. Poynter
  • Bryan Langholz
  • Joan Largent
  • Lene Mellemkjaer
  • Leslie Bernstein
  • Kathleen E. Malone
  • Charles F. Lynch
  • Åke Borg
  • Patrick Concannon
  • Sharon N. Teraoka
  • Shanyan Xue
  • Anh T. Diep
  • Therese Törngren
  • Colin B. Begg
  • Marinela Capanu
  • Robert W. Haile
  • Jonine L. Bernstein
Show all

Summary, in English

Reproductive factors, such as early age at menarche, late age at menopause, and nulliparity are known risk factors for breast cancer. Previously, we reported these factors to be associated with risk of developing contralateral breast cancer (CBC). In this study, we evaluated the association between these factors and CBC risk among BRCA1 and BRCA2 (BRCA1/2) mutation carriers and non-carriers. The WECARE Study is a population-based multi-center case-control study of 705 women with CBC (cases) and 1,397 women with unilateral breast cancer (controls). All participants were screened for BRCA1/2 mutations and 181 carriers were identified. Conditional logistic regression models were used to evaluate associations between reproductive factors and CBC for mutation carriers and non-carriers. None of the associations between reproductive factors and CBC risk differed between mutation carriers and non-carriers. The increase in risk with younger age at menarche and decrease in risk in women with more than two full-term pregnancies seen in non-carriers were not significantly different in carriers (adjusted RRs = 1.31, 95% CI 0.65-2.65 and 0.53, 95% CI 0.19-1.51, respectively). No significant associations between the other reproductive factors and CBC risk were observed in mutation carriers or non-carriers. For two reproductive factors previously shown to be associated with CBC risk, we observed similar associations for BRCA1/2 carriers. This suggests that reproductive variables that affect CBC risk may have similar effects in mutation carriers and non-carriers.

Department/s

  • Breastcancer-genetics
  • BioCARE: Biomarkers in Cancer Medicine improving Health Care, Education and Innovation

Publishing year

2010

Language

English

Pages

839-846

Publication/Series

Cancer Causes and Control

Volume

21

Issue

6

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

Springer

Topic

  • Cancer and Oncology

Keywords

  • Reproductive factors
  • Contralateral breast cancer
  • BRCA1
  • BRCA2

Status

Published

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 1573-7225