Review article

BREAST CANCER TREATMENT AND LATER FERTILITY

Miro Kasum

Abstract

The article presents an overview regarding the influence of breast cancer treatment on later fertility. Al-though breast-conserving surgery is desirable in nulliparous women regarding later fertility, however because of a greater risk of local recurrence it is often accompanied by adjuvant therapy including chemotherapy, ovarian ablation, anti-estro-gen therapy and combination of these. Although chemotherapy and radiotherapy have increased long-term survival of premenopausal women with breast cancer, sometimes the price paid is ovarian failure with subsequent amenorrhea and infertility. However, currently several fertility-sparing options including the use of endocrine therapy and assisted reproduc-tive technologies, cryopreservation and ovarian tissue transplantation, are showing a very promising role. The offspring of patients who became pregnant after completion of chemotherapy have shown no adverse effects and congenital anomalies from the treatment, but sometimes high abortion (29%) and premature deliveries with low birth weight (40%) rates have been demonstrated. Therefore, the issue of recent cytotoxic treatment remains controversial and further researches are required to define a »safety period« between cessation of treatment and pregnancy.

Keywords

breast cancer; treatment; fertility; pregnancy

Hrčak ID:

15796

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/15796

Publication date:

1.12.2005.

Article data in other languages: croatian

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