Cancer recurs in 'dense' breasts

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Women treated for breast cancer are at a higher risk of a relapse if they have "dense" breasts, say researchers, reports BBC.
Those with denser breasts are four times more likely to see their cancer return, compared to women with less dense breasts, says the journal Cancer.
The Canadian authors advise that women with the densest breasts should have radiotherapy while the women with less dense breasts could be spared.
The potential to spare women, without dense tissue, radiotherapy is a very attractive prospect - but further studies will be necessary to be sure that this is safe practice
The researchers from the Women's College Hospital in Toronto, Canada, looked at the medical records of 335 women who underwent surgery for invasive breast cancer and for whom a pre-treatment mammogram was available.Breast density was higher in the younger women in the study, which surveyed women with an average age of 63.5 years.
The women in the high density group experienced a much greater risk of breast cancer returning.
Over a 10 year period, they had a 21pc risk of cancer recurrence, compared to a 5% risk for women with the least dense breasts.
After 10 years, the difference in the rates of disease recurrence for women who did not receive radiotherapy after surgery was more pronounced, with 40% of women with high density breasts experiencing cancer recurrence compared with none of the women with the lowest density of breasts.
The authors said their findings indicated that women with low breast density, may not need radiotherapy, but that women with high breast density could significantly benefit from the therapy.