Fertility drugs have become more popular in the past decade as more and more women are having babies at a later age. However many women are reluctant to take fertility drugs due to their apparent capacity to cause breast cancer. But now some experts claim they have debunked that hypothesis.
CBS news reports on the apparent lack of a link between fertility drugs and breast cancer.
The general consensus among the scientific community in recent years has been that fertility drugs cause breast cancer. But new research shows that there is no such link and women can freely take fertility drugs to enhance their propensity to get pregnant.
CBS explains how the study was conducted, “Widely used fertility drugs don't seem to increase a woman's risk of breast cancer, according to a new study. Researchers analyzed data from more than 9,800 American women who were evaluated for infertility between 1965 and 1988 and followed until 2010. During the follow-up period, 749 of the women developed breast cancer. Overall, women who took Clomid (clomiphene citrate) or gonadotropins as part of fertility treatments were not more likely to develop breast cancer than those who didn't take the drugs, according to the study which was recently published.”
The chief of reproductive epidemiology at the U.S. National Cancer Institute issued a statement saying, “Overall, our data show that use of fertility drugs does not increase breast cancer risk in this population of women, which is reassuring. The observed increase in risk for these small subsets of women may be related to persistent infertility rather than an effect of the medications. Nevertheless, these findings stress the importance of continued monitoring of women who are exposed to fertility drugs. Given the high doses of drugs received by our study participants and the lack of large increases in breast cancer risk many years after exposure, women previously exposed to such drugs should be reassured by these findings."
