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Black women face higher breast cancer risk

Posted on: Tuesday, 24 March 2009, 21:28 CDT

Black women are three times more likely to develop an aggressive triple negative breast tumor compared with women of other racial backgrounds,

The study, published in the journal Breast Cancer Research, found that even taking these factors into consideration, black women face higher risk of triple negative tumors -- tumors that lack expression of the estrogen receptor, the progesterone receptor and the HER2 gene -- compared with women of other racial backgrounds.

In the United States, which has the highest rate of breast cancer in the world, the overall incidence of breast cancer is lower in black women than in white women.

However, when black women do get breast cancer, it tends to be more advanced when diagnosed, has a higher risk or recurring and a less favorable outcome.

Study leader Dr. Carol Rosenberg of Boston University School of Medicine examined 415 breast cancer cases. The team looked at clinical features particularly patient age, weight and race/ethnicity, and pathological features including the triple-negative pattern.

The odds of having a triple negative tumor were three times higher for black women than for non-black women in the study, Rosenberg said in a statement.

Previously, it was known that pre-menopausal black women had more triple negative tumors. What we found that was new was that these tumors were just as common in black women diagnosed before or after age 50, and in those who were or were not obese.

Source: United Press International

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