Breast Cancer Survivorship Optimizing Follow-up Care: Patients Perspectives of their Practical Needs

Breast Cancer Survivorship – Optimizing Follow-up Care: Patients’ Perspectives of their Practical Needs

Breast cancer is still recognized as the most common cancer among American women with 1 in 8 women (12%) who will develop invasive breast cancer and about 39,510 women who will die from breast cancer, with 23,644 expected cases for California in 2013. Although breast cancer is the second leading cause of cancer death in women, exceeded only by lung cancer, death rates from breast cancer have rapidly declined since 1990, with larger decreases in women younger than fifty due to earlier detection, surveillance, increased awareness and improved treatment, resulting in more than 2.9 million breast cancer survivors (BCS) in the United States.