The American Cancer Society helps people with breast cancer in every community.
Our research program has played a role in many of the prevention, screening, and treatment advances that save lives from breast cancer today. And, we continue to fund research to help save even more lives in the future.
The American Cancer Society's Population Science department includes scientists who work with our large, on-going cancer prevention studies (CPS), such as CPS-II and CPS-3. Several ACS staff scientists and ACS grantees have contributed to the work of the United States-based Cancer Risk Estimates Related to Susceptibility (CARRIERS) consortium, which conducts population- and family-based studies of breast cancer. Here's an overview of some of those publications from the last year.
A CARRIER Study
“This study is an example of how simulation modeling can shed important insight on breast cancer prevention by providing estimates of the benefits and harms associated with screening, particularly for the use of MRI to screen women with a higher risk for developing breast cancer due to ATM, CHEK2, and PALB2 variants.”—Jennifer Yeh, PhD, ACS grantee Boston Children's Hospital
See the highlight about Dr. Yeh's published study.
“In the last 2 years, my family experienced cancer first hand, and boy has that grounded me. (She was diagnosed with a rare cancer, and her mother was diagnosed with inflammatory breast cancer (IBC) even though none of the known risk factors applied to her.) I felt this was important for me to share publicly, as I consider American Cancer Society extended family.
“So to all who are listening, I’ll say, ‘cancer—or for that matter, any ailment—is personal’. I still have moments when it hits me that despite my work in this area, numerous talks I’ve given, and access to care on rare cancer, a rare cancer went undetected in my family, and another rare cancer was barely detected on time." —Gayanthri R. Devi, PhD, Duke University School of Medicine
Hear the podcast about Dr. Devi's research.
A CARRIER Study
“Ultimately, the goal is to put together everything we know about what increases and decreases the risk for developing breast cancer and for surviving it. That ‘everything’ would include genetics, reproductive history, geographic location, socioeconomic factors, exposures to infections and pollutants, medical history, smoking and drinking history, diet, and more. When we can account for all of these factors together, we’ll be able to empower women with personalized, specific strategies to reduce their own risk of getting or dying from cancer.”—Lauren Teras, PhD
See the highlight about Dr. Teras' published study.
The American Cancer Society (ACS) employs a staff of full-time researchers and funds scientists across the United States who relentlessly search for answers to help us better understand cancer, including breast cancer. Here are some highlights of their work.
“The ability to grow patient tumor cells in a dish allows us to accelerate personalized medicine. We can now test a large number of drugs on diverse patient tumors and use genomic analysis to learn which differences in gene expression between patients’ tumors are associated with the response to each drug.”—Katherine Varley, PhD
See the highlight about Dr. Varley's published study.
“Body weight plays an important role in the development, treatment, and survival of breast cancer. While this study helps us better understand the role body weight before a diagnosis has on survival after a diagnosis of breast cancer, it is difficult to disentangle the multifactorial role of body weight.” –Mia Gaudet, PhD
See the highlight about Dr. Gaudet's published study.
“It is necessary for all health centers to address racial disparities in care and to atone for the decades of medical and public health mistreatment of Black persons, including the consequences of historical redlining. We have a responsibility as medical and public health professionals to reckon with systemic racism, and our own privileges, when developing health promotion and intervention activities.”—Jessica Star, MA, MPH
See the highlight about Jessica Star's published study.
The American Cancer Society funds scientists who conduct research about cancer at medical schools, universities, research institutes, and hospitals throughout the United States. We use a rigorous and independent peer review process to select the most innovative research projects proposals to fund.
Each year, the American Cancer Society's Surveillance and Health Equity Science (SHES) team analyzes data on cancer in the United States, including breast cancer, as part of its Cancer Facts & Figures report. Every 3 years they publish the Breast Cancer Facts & Figures report. In addition to these educational publications, the ACS journal for clinicians, CA, publishes a "Cancer Statistics" report. The process is led by Rebecca Siegel, MPH.
These publications provide detailed analyses and estimates of breast cancer incidence and mortality trends in the United States. They also have the latest information on breast cancer risk factors, screening, early detection, treatment, and current research.
Key breast cancer statistics in the US include:
Find more 2022 statistics about breast cancer on the Cancer Statistics Center:
Use the analysis tool in the drop-down menu to see any of these statistics in comparison to other types of cancer.