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Previous Volume 346:2025-2032 June 27, 2002 Number 26 Next

	Full Text PDF PDA Full Text PowerPoint Slide Set Supplementary Material Editorial by Davidson, N. E. Letters Add to Personal Archive Add to Citation Manager Notify a Friend E-mail When Cited PubMed Citation

ABSTRACT

Background It is uncertain whether the use of an oral contraceptive increases the risk of breast cancer later in life, when the incidence of breast cancer is increased. We conducted a population-based, case–control study to determine the risk of breast cancer among former and current users of oral contraceptives.

Methods We interviewed women who were 35 to 64 years old. A total of 4575 women with breast cancer and 4682 controls were interviewed. Conditional logistic regression was used to calculate odds ratios as estimates of the relative risk (incidence-density ratios) of breast cancer.

Results The relative risk was 1.0 (95 percent confidence interval, 0.8 to 1.3) for women who were currently using oral contraceptives and 0.9 (95 percent confidence interval, 0.8 to 1.0) for those who had previously used them. The relative risk did not increase consistently with longer periods of use or with higher doses of estrogen. The results were similar among white and black women. Use of oral contraceptives by women with a family history of breast cancer was not associated with an increased risk of breast cancer, nor was the initiation of oral-contraceptive use at a young age.

Conclusions Among women from 35 to 64 years of age, current or former oral-contraceptive use was not associated with a significantly increased risk of breast cancer.

Source Information

From the Division of Reproductive Health, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta (P.A.M., J.A.M., H.G.W., S.G.F., M.G.M.); the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle (J.R.D., K.E.M.); the Department of Preventive Medicine, Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles (L.B., G.U.); the Center for Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics and the Department of Biostatistics and Epidemiology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia (B.L.S., S.A.N.); and the Division of Epidemiology, Karmanos Cancer Institute, Wayne State University, Detroit (L.K.W.).

Other authors were Phyllis A. Wingo, Ph.D., Department of Epidemiology and Surveillance Research, American Cancer Society, Atlanta; Ronald T. Burkman, M.D., Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Bay State Medical Center, Springfield, Mass.; Jesse A. Berlin, Sc.D., Center for Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics and Department of Biostatistics and Epidemiology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia; Michael S. Simon, M.D., M.P.H., Division of Hematology and Oncology, Karmanos Cancer Institute, Wayne State University, Detroit; and Robert Spirtas, Dr.P.H., Contraception and Reproductive Health Branch, Center for Population Research, National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, Bethesda, Md.

Full Text of this Article

Related Letters:

Oral Contraceptives and the Risk of Breast Cancer
Althuis M. D., Brinton L. A., Grant E. C.G., Friedenson B., Marchbanks P. A., McDonald J. A., Wilson H. G.
Extract | Full Text | PDF  
N Engl J Med 2002; 347:1448-1449, Oct 31, 2002. Correspondence

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