Breast Cancer Risk Factors

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These are indicators only and how they interact is difficult to predict. Women can do all the rights things and still get breast cancer. Likewise, women can do all the wrong things and never get the disease.

Family history: A woman with a mother, sister or daughter with breast cancer has around double the risk of getting it herself than a woman with no family history.

Obesity: Being overweight or obese is thought to increases the risk of postmenopausal breast cancer by up to 30%, because excess body fat raises levels of hormones such as oestrogen and insulin - common features of cancers.

Age: the older the woman, the higher her risk. Women aged 50-69 are most at risk, particularly those who have a late menopause.

Childbirth: The younger a woman has children, the lower her risk. Having children at all cuts the risk, as does breastfeeding.

Lifestyle: regular physical exercise and a healthy diet helps reduce the risk by cutting dangerous fatty body tissues. Smoking is not advised.

HRT: women using hormone replacement therapy have a 66% increased risk of breast cancer but the risk is temporary, returning to that of a never-user within five years of stopping.

Oral contraceptives: they increase risk by around a quarter but since users are generally younger women, their risk is relatively low.

Alcohol: drinking as little as one alcoholic drink per day increases breast cancer risk by around 12%.

Source: Cancer Research UK