Breast cancer and hormonal contraceptives: Collaborative reanalysis of individual data on 53297 women with breast cancer and 100239 women without breast cancer from 54 epidemiological studies

Background The Collaborative Group on Hormonal Factors in Breast Cancer has brought together and reanalysed the worldwide epidemiological evidence on the relation between breast cancer risk and use of hormonal contraceptives. Methods Individual data on 53297 women with breast cancer and 100 239 women without breast cancer from 54 studies conducted in 25 countries were collected, checked, and analysed centrally. Estimates of the relative risk for breast cancer were obtained by a modification of the Mantel-Haenszel method. All analyses were stratified by study, age at diagnosis, parity, and, where appropriate, the age a woman was when her first child was born, and the age she was when her risk of conception ceased. Findings The results provide strong evidence for two main conclusions. First, while women are taking combined oral contraceptives and in the 10 years after stopping there is a small increase in the relative risk of having breast cancer diagnosed (relative risk [95% CI] in current users 1.24 [1.15-1.33], 2p