Breast Cancer Risk in Childhood Cancer Survivors

JohnSmith

Breast Cancer Risk in Childhood Cancer Survivors With No History of Chest Radiotherapy: A Report From the Childhood Cancer Survivor Study.
The authors evaluated 3768 female childhood cancer survivors with no history of chest radiotherapy to determine cumulative breast cancer risk. Median follow-up was 25.5 years. Compared with the general population, childhood cancer survivors had a fourfold increased risk for breast cancer, with sarcoma and leukemia survivors having the highest risk. Sarcoma survivors had a cumulative incidence of breast cancer of 5.8% by the age of 45 years, and leukemia survivors had a cumulative incidence of 6.3%. There was a dose-dependent association between alkylators and anthracyclines and increased risk of breast cancer.
This may suggest a possible underlying gene-environment interaction that warrants further study.

** These studies intrigue me since the wife is a childhood cancer survivor.
At the age of ~14 (30 years ago), she had a rare "non hodgkin's Lymphoblastic Lymphoma" in her leg. As part of a pediatric clinical trial, she had eight different chemo drugs (including intrathecal chemo) over 18 months and received rads to her leg.
Today, Lymphoblastic Lymphoma is considered the same as "Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia" [ALL], according to this Nov 2015 article, in case there are others that have a similar story.