Early Breast-Feeding Cuts Cancer Risk, Study Finds : Research: The longer that nursing continues, the better the chances that pre-menopausal women can avoid breast malignancy, research shows.
The longer that mothers breast-feed, and the younger they begin, the more they lower their risk of getting breast cancer before menopause, a large study has found.
It found that a woman who begins breast-feeding in her teens and continues for at least six months cuts the cancer risk almost in half.
The study found no evidence that nursing prevents the disease from occurring after menopause. Breast cancer before menopause is relatively rare.
Except for those who began nursing in their teens, the reduction in risk was generally small, about 22%. The finding is still noteworthy because breast-feeding represents one of the few voluntary things that women might do to change their odds of this cancer.
Experts in the past have wondered about the possible effects of breast-feeding, but the data has been murky. Some earlier studies linked nursing with reduced cancer risk, while others found no correlation.
The latest study was directed by Dr. Polly A. Newcomb of the University of Wisconsin and published in Thursday’s New England Journal of Medicine.
“There are a number of reasons to breast-feed,” Newcomb said. “First and foremost is to provide the child with complete nutrition and psychological benefits. But a woman might also consider the possibility that this could reduce her risk of breast cancer.”
Her study was based on a review of 5,878 breast cancer patients in Wisconsin, Massachusetts, Maine and New Hampshire. Their nursing habits were compared to those of 8,216 women who did not have breast cancer.
The study found that a woman who begins breast-feeding before age 20 and continues for at least six months cuts her risk of breast cancer before menopause by 46%.
The researchers estimate that if all women with children breast-fed for at least two years, the incidence of breast cancer before menopause would fall by nearly 25%.
Breast cancer is second only to lung cancer as a cause of death among women.
