increased risk?

I had my TAH on feb 13th, my question is this. I heard (after the fact) that having a hysterectomy can increase your risk of getting breast cancer. Is this true? just wondering if I should be extra vigilent.

Hi,
We had our surgery on the same day..
I heard that a hysterectomy with removal of the ovaries can decrease your risk. Although I don't know about a hyst. and keeping your ovaries.
There are some very knowledgeable ladies on this board that should be able to answer your question.

Cat

	Quote:
Originally Posted by TatCat Hi, We had our surgery on the same day.. I heard that a hysterectomy with removal of the ovaries can decrease your risk. Although I don't know about a hyst. and keeping your ovaries. There are some very knowledgeable ladies on this board that should be able to answer your question. Cat

thanks Cat. I kept my ovaries. that is good news about the decreased risk. I hope it is the same for keeping ovaries as well.

Since no one has spoken up with An Answer I'll throw this out: I seem to remember that keeping your ovaries just brings you back to 'normal'. The reduced risk after hyst. being mainly about the hormones, or lack there of, especially the estrogen.

Someone mentioned, in another thread here in breast health, a useful Web site. I don't know if this is the same site or not but I just loaded up www.breastcancer.org and they do have a section called Lower Your Risk (right hand end of the string of purple buttons that starts with Home on the left) that probably has some info. And I just learned something new from the top headline on their site: "Breast cancer vaccine may reduce risk of death". I didn't even know that a vaccine existed! (of course right below that is a link to an article titled "Estrogen therapy linked to benign breast disease")

With a family history (just tried to spell history as hystory - Freudian slip?) I try to at least keep aware of some of these things.

Thank you so much for your reply. I will look at the website you suggested. thanks again, and I already feel better about it.

Puppy Love,
Thank you for posting that link. I have saved it to read through.
I have a family history of breast cancer, and it looks like a really good resource.
My Gyn/Onc gave me a site that is also pretty good. it's www.wcn.org
There is a lot of good info there as well.

Cat

Thanks Cat - I took a quick look around wcn.org. Lots of info about a wide variety of "girl cancers".

Here's a funny one for you: I took their risk assessment and they said I have an average risk for endometrial cancer - I wonder how that would work, not having a uterus and all. I think my risk for ovarian cancer was slightly lower than normal - again, no ovaries!

(yeah, yeah, the endometriosis could be hiding out somewhere, waiting for me to start hrt at which point it will burst back in to life and some those cells could conceivably end up cancerous - just let me enjoy my little chuckle for the moment)

LOL! It told me the same thing, I have no uterus or ovaries as well..
I got a chuckle out of it myself.

Cat