“Patients are confronted with the fear of developing a cancer in the opposite breast, and in the future, and also undergoing routine mammography screening either every six months or every year after their first cancer to look for the presence of a second cancer in the opposite breast,” Dr. Giannakeas said.
“If they do develop a cancer in the opposite breast, they’ll have to then undergo some additional treatment, such as surgery, possibly radiotherapy or chemotherapy, so they have all these things to think about that could potentially happen down the line. They (those that choose bilateral mastectomy) ultimately decide they want to avoid all these potential scenarios by just removing their opposite breast.”
This new data can help provide breast cancer patients with more to think about when it comes to their options, especially if mortality is their biggest fear. On the theoretical side, Dr. Giannakeas finds that there’s a disconnect between the data and what’s already been accepted as valid in terms of treatments versus mortality risk.
“Where we need to go forward with research is trying to understand what’s going on in terms of the natural history of breast cancer and what’s actually causing this observation where you’re preventing cancers, but you’re not necessarily reducing mortality,” he said. “Our current hypothesis is that the contralateral breast cancer, which has been thought to be an independent new cancer, we think may actually be some sort of marker for the presence of metastases.”