Women in the Republic have a poor knowledge of the causes and risk factors associated with breast cancer, a major study has found. Dr Muiris Houston, Medical Correspondent, reports.
The results, published in the European Journal of Cancer, show that men here know more than women about key aspects of breast cancer, such as risk, age of onset and treatment.
Researchers from St Vincent's Hospital Dublin, led by consultant physician Dr Hugh Mulcahy, questioned almost 2,500 people in the State as part of the Irish National Cancer and Cardiac Awareness Survey.
Some 66 per cent of women overestimated their risk of developing breast cancer, while 88 per cent of those surveyed underestimated the age at which the disease was most likely to develop. Over half the female respondents were unduly pessimistic about a woman's chance of being alive five years after a diagnosis of breast cancer.
Knowledge of other factors, such as the protective effect of early pregnancy, was poor, while two-thirds of women thought breast cancer was associated with stress. Some 20 per cent of men correctly identified the lifetime risk of a woman developing breast cancer; just 14 per cent of women did. The overall lifetime risk of developing breast cancer is approximately one in 12. Its peak incidence is in the early 70s. Overall, five-year survival following diagnosis is over 70 per cent.