Catching breast cancer early ‘slashes risk of dying’ – the 7 signs you must know

NINETY-FIVE per cent of breast cancer patients now survive the disease for at least five years thanks to huge advances in treatment.

Oxford University research shows the risk of dying in women who catch it early has fallen by two thirds in the past 20 years.

The study tracked more than half a million women from 1993 to 2020 to see how life expectancy has improved.

Dr Carolyn Taylor said: “Our study is good news for women diagnosed with early breast cancer because their prognosis has improved so much.”

Michelle Mitchell, of Cancer Research UK, added: “It’s heart-warming that women today have more time with their families and loved ones.

“Receiving any cancer diagnosis is an extremely worrying time, but this study can offer reassurance for many women.”

Around 55,000 women and 370 men are diagnosed with breast cancer every year in the UK.

New drugs like Keytruda — which reduces the chances of the disease spreading by nearly two fifths — have been made available over the years to improve survival rates.

While the risk of dying with the disease has been falling for decades, the extent of this fall was previously unknown.

The study, published in the British Medical Journal, tracked women with early breast cancer — confined to the breast and axillary lymph nodes — who were treated after surgery.

They looked at whether patients died within a year or five years to calculate their risks.

More than six in 10 women diagnosed from 2010 to 2015 had a five-year death risk of just 3 per cent.

Dr Taylor said: “The prognosis for women diagnosed with early invasive breast cancer has improved substantially since the 1990s.

"Most can expect to be long-term cancer survivors.