Demographic Characteristics and Clinical Tableau of 1500 Cases of Breast Cancer in Iranian Women

Introduction & Breast cancer is the most common malignancy in adult female population. Great variations exist in incidence and mortality rate of this cancer in different populations. One of the most important and central factors that can greatly affect mortality of a cancer in a population is the stage of cancer which comes under medical attention. In this study, we describe characteristics of 1500 cases of breast cancer at the time of diagnosis and evaluate probable association between some factors and stage of cancer in which cancer comes under medical attention. This retrospective study reviewed files of 1500 cases of female breast cancer. These cases had been referred to a breast cancer private clinic and diagnosis of breast cancer was confirmed by pathologic study. Data about following factors were extracted from files: age of patients, educational level, profession, interval between seeking medical attention and diagnosis confirmation, family history of breast cancer in first-degree relatives, method of diagnosis, results of mammography, tumor size, number of involved lymph nodes, total number of resected lymph nodes, and pathologic stage of tumor. All data of been obtained at the time of diagnosis. Mean age of patients was 49.38± 10.46 years. From patients with known size of tumor, 74.5% had a size of more than 2 cm in our population and in patients with known stage of disease, 78.3% of patients were stage 2 or more which means that they had at least one involved lymph node. On an average, an interval of 2.73 ±1.15 years existed between the time of suspicion and time of definite diagnosis. Finally we conclude that stage of breast cancer at presentation is higher in our country when compared with western countries. This difference is both the result of lower compliance of patients and defects in public services.