A recent study in US has sought help for women who have been previously treated for breast cancer in one of the breasts in order to make a better decision about the right time to have a preventive mastectomy. This is the procedure to remove the unaffected part of the breast in recognising the kinds of patients as well as the tumours that present the highest risk of increasing cancer in the other breast.

Getting the breast cancer in of the breasts increases the chances of getting the cancer in the second breast of a woman either at the same time or later. Searching out those women who had the highest risk of developing cancer in the other breast would help the patients make a better decision about the treatment in advance which may even include removing the other breast completely.

Women who opt to get the other breast removed by mastectomy would do so because of a number of reasons. Firstly, they would want to avoid the painful cancer diagnosis or secondly if their doctor advises it or even if they want both the breasts to look similar to each other. However, there isn’t enough evidence that can help women make the right kind of choices.

A lot of doctors believe that major mastectomies are frequently performed needlessly and they can in addition build up complications that have nothing to do with the cancer.