10 Breast Cancer Myths
What's fact and fiction when it comes to taking care of "your girls"
(Content provided by BreastCancer.org)
Myth 1: If breast cancer runs in your family, it automatically means that you're going to get it, too.
Fact: Getting breast cancer is not a certainity, even if you have one of the significant risk factors, like strong family history or a known breast cancer gene abnormality. For example, of women with BRCA1 or BRCA2 inherited genetic abnormality. 40 to80 percent will develop breast cancer over their lifetime; 20 to 60 percent won't. All other breast cancer risk factors ew associated witha much , much lower probability of being diagnosed with breast cancer
Myth 2: Only your mother's damily history of breast cancer can affect your risk.
Fact: A history of breast cancer on your mother's OR your father's family equally influence your risk. That's because half of your genes come from your mother,half from your father. But a man with a breast- cancer gene abnormality us less likely to developbreast cancer than a woman with a similiar gene. So, if you want to learn more about your father's family history, you have to look mainly ath the women on your father's side, not hust the men.
Myth 3:Breast cancer skips generations.
Fact: Genes that could increase the risk for breast cancer can go from one generation to the next, without skipping a generation. If your mother or father has a breast cnacer gene abnormality , you may have a 50 percent risk of getting the gene and a 50 percent chance of not getting it. If you don't get the
