What does a study on removing both breasts when cancer is found in one tell us? Elizabeth Tracey reports

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 Three groups of women, all with breast cancer in one breast, participated in a recent study looking at whether removing both breasts when cancer is found in one, so-called prophylactic bilateral mastectomy, was effective in reducing a woman’s risk. Kimmel Cancer Center director William Nelson looks at the data.

Nelson: What they came up with was that if you look at the propensity for breast cancer to appear in the other breast, the contralateral breast it was 7% or so. The other finding was that overall breast cancer survival seemed to be unaffected. If you look at the number of deaths in each of these groups it's about the same, it's about 8 1/2 to 9 percent.   :26

Nelson says the study comes up with contradictory findings and really isn’t informative when it comes to an individual woman’s choice. He says each woman must consider the constellation of factors describing her personal experience to determine her best treatment options. At Johns Hopkins, I’m Elizabeth Tracey.