Am I at Risk for Breast Cancer?

Some risks can be controlled, while others cannot.

Some risk factors for breast cancer, such as your family history, cannot be controlled. However, other factors can be, such as drinking alcohol and having excess weight. Knowing your breast cancer risk factors helps you make informed choices about your lifestyle and cancer screenings.

Risks within your control include:

• Use of oral contraceptives. Taking birth control pills slightly increases your breast cancer risk compared with women who have never used them.
• Drinking alcohol. Breast cancer risk goes up if you drink just one glass of wine, beer, or mixed drink a day. The more you drink, the higher your risk.
• Your diet. Choose to eat healthy foods, rather than foods high in fat.
• Long-term use of estrogen and progestin medicines after menopause. Known as hormone replacement therapy (HRT). Using HRT for two or more years may create a higher chance of breast cancer. Talk to your doctor about the right course of treatment for you.
• Excess weight, especially after menopause. Overall, your risk of breast cancer is lower if you stay at a healthy weight with a body mass index (BMI) below 25.

Other breast cancer risks:

• Sex. Breast cancer occurs nearly 100 times more often in women than in men.
• Ethnicity. Caucasian women develop breast cancer slightly more often than other ethnicities.
• Age. Two out of three women with invasive cancer are diagnosed after age 55.
• Personal history. If you’ve had cancer in one breast, you are at risk of having it in the other breast.
• Previous chest radiation. If you’ve had high-dose radiation to your chest, you have an increased risk. (The small doses used for breast cancer screenings do not increase your risk.)
• Family history. Having a parent, sibling, or child with breast cancer increases your risk.
• Benign breast disease. Women with certain benign breast conditions, such as hyperplasia or atypical hyperplasia have an increased risk.
• Diethylstilbestrol (DES) exposure. Women who took this medicine while pregnant to lower the chance of miscarriage are at higher risk. Women whose mothers took DES during pregnancy may also have a higher risk.
• Early menstrual periods. Women whose periods began before age 12 have a higher risk of breast cancer.
• Late menopause. Women are at a slightly higher risk if they started menopause after age 55.
• Not giving birth or giving birth to your first child after age 30. These women have a slightly higher breast cancer risk.
• Dense breast tissue. Women whose breasts have significant areas of dense tissue on mammograms are at increased risk for breast cancer.
• Breast cancer genes. Inherited changes in genes can be another risk factor and account for 5-10% of all breast cancer cases. Learn more about breast cancer genes.

Worried about your breast cancer risks? Find an RWJBarnabas Health physician to discuss it with.

To contact one of New Jersey’s best breast cancer specialists call
844-CANCERNJ or 844-226-2376.