Breast Cancer Risk Factors

Breast cancer risk factors can increase or decrease your risk of developing breast cancer. They can be related to your lifestyle, life choices and the environment or inherited.

Not necessarily, because there is no single cause of breast cancer. Having particular risk factors doesn’t mean that you will definitely get breast cancer and conversely, not having many risk factors doesn’t mean that you won’t.

Risk factors simply increase or decrease your chances of developing the disease.

So, even if you have a risk factor and are diagnosed with breast cancer, there’s no way of proving that the risk factor actually caused it.

We have graded risk factors identifed to date as to their likely involvement with breast cancer. Here’s some of them that are graded. More information on additional risk factors is available in our publication Breast Cancer Risk Factors: The Facts (517 kb)

These factors have significant scientific evidence linking them to increased or decreased breast cancer risk.

age
alcohol
genetics – breast cancer in the family
hormone replacement therapy (HRT)
pregnancy
the contraceptive pill
weight

Possible risk factors have some scientific evidence to suggest a link with breast cancer, though more research is needed before we can really tell if they increase or decrease the risk of developing the disease.

diet
stress

A doubtful risk factor is one that current scientific research cannot prove is linked to the disease. This may be because there’s no evidence to show a link or where research has positively ruled any association out.

Despite this, doubtful risk factors often receive media attention, which can cause confusion about the safety of some activities or products.

deodorants and antiperspirants

You can learn more about risk factors in our publication: Breast Cancer Risk Factors: The Facts (517 kb)