Breast Cancer in Young Women

Worldwide breast cancer is the leading cancer dilemma of the older adult women. Younger women form the minority of breast cancer patients. In Iraqi Kurdistan we seem to be seeing more patients at younger ages and with more advanced stages of the disease. The aim of this study is to find out the extent of this problem in women ≤ 40 years. Clinical pathological and demographic data of breast cancer in Hiwa Cancer Hospital (HCH) in Sulaymaniyah were analyzed. These young-age breast cancer data were then compared to local all-age data from the region also with Middle Eastern Western and Asian countries. By end of this retrospective / prospective study of hundred breast cancer young survivors the authors concluded that breast cancer in this group of patients is about 13% of all breast cancer ladies in HCH. It is more common as compared to developed countries. Majority of patients were diagnosed at advanced stages and their tumors exhibited more aggressive clinico-pathological features. Further studies with large number of patients and case controls are recommended to validate these initial findings and investigate survival / local and distant control in this group of patients.