As part of our commitment to the Passionate Pursuit of Prevention campaign being undertaken by Healthy Hispanic Living and its partners, ThinkNow Research has been asking a nationally representative group of Latinas about issues related to breast cancer.  

According to the American Cancer Society, breast cancer will claim 40,000 lives this year. In the Hispanic/Latino community, breast cancer rates are relatively lower than those found in the Caucasian community, as data from the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center cites that Latinas are one-third less likely to have breast cancer than non-Hispanic white women.

BCRF investigator Dawn Hershman, MD, MS of Columbia University Medical Center and BCRF Grantee looks for differences in recurrence scores between Hispanic and non-Hispanic white women with the most common type of the disease.

Breast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer among Hispanic women, according to the American Cancer Society, and while rates of breast cancer in Latinas are lower than those of non-Hispanic whites, Latinas are more likely to have breast cancer diagnosed in its later stages.

Though Hispanic women typically have lower rates of breast cancer diagnosis compared to non-Hispanic white women, when it comes to triple-negative breast cancer, the situations are reversed.