Breast cancer among women over 75 years: an important public health problem?

Women aged >75 years are not invited for mammographic screening; if diagnosed with breast cancer, due to their anticipated short-life expectancy, they are expected to die of other causes. To describe the breast cancer health problem in women aged >75 years, we estimated breast cancer incidence in this age group and the risk of breast cancer death in patients diagnosed after 75 years of age in Nijmegen, the Netherlands. Our findings demonstrate that in this age group, 3.3% of the women will be diagnosed with breast cancer, and that one in three of these incident cases die of this disease. These patients could have benefited from continued screening