An Epidemiological Study Of Cancer Breast In Greater Cairo:

Abdo Salama Abdo

- 146 -SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONBreast cancer has been recognized as a maj or pub lichealth problem in many countries of the world. and numerousstudies of its epidemiology have been undertaken.The aim of this study was the identification of the mostimportant risk factors and the association between these riskfactors and the occurrence of breast cancer.This study was conducted among 189 women who wereclinically and pathological diagnosed as breast cancer casesand 192 controls with non malignant disease.This study was carried oui in surgical and radiotherapydepartments of Ain Shams University hospital and surgicaldepartment of Benha University hospital.Every person in this study was subjected to a designedquestionnaire. clinical examination and anthropometricmeasurements.The results of this work could be summarized as follow:Breast cancer was found to be more prevalent on the rightbreast than the left one.- Cancer breast increases progressively with age and reachesmaximum at age group 59-69 years then declines after age ofsixty years.- As regards reproductive factors it was found that :* Cancer breast occurs more commonly among women With earlymenarche (below age of 13 years) and late natural- -- -.- --- --._-- 147 -menopause (after age of 48 years). Also artificialmenopause proved to have a great role in occurrence ofcancer breast.* The heighest occurrence of cancer breast occurred amongwomen with regular and prolonged duration of menstrualflow (7 days or more).Regarding the conceptional and interconceptional factors:* Cancer breast occurs more commonly among women who neverbeen pregnant and the occurrence increases withincreasing number of pregnancies.* Cancer breast increases linearly with increasing the ageat first birth.* The OCcurrence o f cancer breast was found to be higheramong aborted ~’oman and the risk increased withincreasing the num,ber of abortions.* Cancer breast occurred more commonlynever used oral contraceptive pillsamong cases whothan among pillsusers.- As regards the relation with socioeconomic factors:* Cancer breast is more common among small families withlow crOWding indel: (below 2) and high family income /month.* Also. it was found that the disease is more common amongworking rather than non working women.* Positive family history was found to be an important.contributing factor in occurrence of the disease.-- - - - - - ---- -- - - -- - - - - ----.- --.- --- - - -- - ----- 148 -- As regards anthropometric measures it was found that breastcancer cases were significantly heavier in weights andtaller than the controls.- As regards radiation exposure. breast cancer occurred morecommonly among previously exposed women to X-ray radiationthan among non exposed women.Stepwise regression analysis was performed by using theOccurrence of cancer breast as a dependent variable toestimate the relat.ive importance of the risk factorsaffecting cancer breast. it was found that the most effectiverisk factors were pclrity followed by age at 1 st birth thenage of menarche. agel of the patient. family history. numberof pregnancies and ag’e of natural menopause.When the age at discovery of cancer breast was used as adependent variable. the multiple regression analysis showedthat the age of menopause. age of menarche. duration ofmenstrual life and the age of marriage were the mostimportant r isk factol~s affecting age of occurrence of thedisease.A recommendation program was suggested to minimize theoccurrence of cancer breast among the Egyptian women. Themain objective of thifl program is to develop the awareness ofthe females about the importance of early detection of thedisease.