Dr. Swain on Pregnant Patients With Breast Cancer

Sandra Swain, MD, medical director of the Washington Cancer Institute at MedStar Washington Hospital Center, professor of medicine at Georgetown University Medical Center, discusses issues with pregnant patients with breast cancer.

With approximately 4,000 to 5,000 patients in the United States with breast cancer during pregnancy, many questions exist regarding treatment. Swain says that most physicians have only treated one or two of these patients and it's scary to have a patient in that situation.

Recent data shows that patients who had breast cancer previously did not have an increased risk of recurrence if they got pregnant. Moreover, these patients' survival was the same regardless of pregnancy status. This study, Swain says, supports not getting an abortion if a patient became pregnant after breast cancer.