NO ASSOCIATION FOUND BETWEEN WEARING BRA, BREAST CANCER
A population-based
case-control study found no association between bra wearing and increased
breast cancer risk among postmenopausal women, according to research published
in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers
& Prevention, a
journal of the American Association for Cancer Research.
"There have been
some concerns that one of the reasons why breast cancer may be more common in
developed countries compared with developing countries is differences in
bra-wearing patterns," said Lu Chen, MPH, a researcher in the Public
Health Sciences Division at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and a
doctoral student in the Department of Epidemiology at the University of
Washington School of Public Health. "Given how common bra wearing is, we
thought this was an important question to address.
"Our study found
no evidence that wearing a bra increases a woman's risk for breast cancer. The
risk was similar no matter how many hours per day women wore a bra, whether
they wore a bra with an underwire, or at what age they first began wearing a bra,"
said Chen.
"There has been
some suggestion in the lay media that bra wearing may be a risk factor for
breast cancer. Some have hypothesized that drainage of waste products in and
around the breast may be hampered by bra wearing. Given very limited biological
evidence supporting such a link between bra wearing and breast cancer risk, our
results were not surprising," Chen added.
According to the study
authors, this study characterizes various bra-wearing habits in relation to
breast cancer risk using a rigorous epidemiological study design. "The
findings provide reassurance to women that wearing a bra does not appear to
increase the risk for the most common histological types of postmenopausal
breast cancer," the authors noted.
Study participants
were 454 women with invasive ductal carcinoma (IDC) and 590 women with invasive
lobular carcinoma (ILC), the two most common subtypes of breast cancer, from
the Seattle-Puget Sound metropolitan area; 469 women who did not have breast
cancer served as controls. All women were postmenopausal, ages 55 to 74.
The researchers
conducted in-person interviews and obtained information on demographics, family
history, and reproductive history. They also asked a series of structured
questions to assess lifetime patterns of bra wearing. Questions included age at
which the study participant started wearing a bra, whether she wore a bra with
an underwire, her bra cup size and band size, the number of hours per day and
number of days per week she wore a bra, and if her bra-wearing patterns ever
changed at different times in her life.
No aspect of wearing a
bra was associated with an increased risk for either IDC or ILC.
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