Dr. Shani Paluch-Shimon, head of the Breast Cancer Unit at the Hadassah Medical Organization, recently co-authored a study investigating the safety of breastfeeding after breast cancer in patients carrying germline BRCA pathogenic or likely pathogenic variants.
The authors concluded that breastfeeding did not appear to be associated with a higher risk of developing locoregional recurrences or contralateral breast cancers.
The international study included 4,732 patients — BRCA carriers diagnosed with stage I-III invasive breast cancer at age 40 or younger — between January 2000 and December 2020 and compared locoregional recurrences and/or contralateral breast cancers, disease-free survival and overall survival between patients who breastfed after delivery and those who did not.
Findings, as published in JNCI: Journal of the National Cancer Institute, suggest that it’s possible to support maternal and infant needs without the risk of compromising oncological safety.
Read more in JNCI: Journal of the National Cancer Institute (full study available to download).