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Would you choose a double mastectomy?

by Jen on August 19th, 2008

News outlets are reporting that actress Christina Applegate has chosen to have a double mastectomy for breast cancer. She chose to do so after undergoing lumpectomies in the affected breast to remove early-stage cancer from one breast and after learning that she is at higher risk for breast cancer due to a mutation in a breast cancer gene, BRCA-1. However, for many early-stage breast cancer patients, mastectomy is not a recommended treatment, and it may not increase survival rates in the long term.

The article states that:

 Growing numbers of women are opting for double mastectomies, even when they have cancer only in one — even when they lack the risk factors of women like Applegate. Among women with cancer in one breast, the risk of developing a tumor in the other breast is less than 1% a year, says Isabelle Bedrosian of Houston’s M.D. Anderson Cancer Center.

If you were in the same situation, what would be the reasons for or against having a double mastectomy? What about women who have not yet developed breast cancer but are at high risk due to genetic or other risk factors? Considering that for many patients, survival rates are the same whether the patient has a lumpectomy or a mastectomy, are physicians doing a disservice to patients who opt for the more drastic procedure?

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POSTED IN: Personalities, Popular Culture, Treatments and Medical Advances