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00:00 - Well, October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month,
00:02 a global effort to promote early detection
00:06 and assist women already undergoing treatment.
00:08 Here in France, there are around 59,000
00:11 new breast cancer cases every year,
00:14 a similar number across the channel in the UK.
00:17 And for more, we can cross to London
00:19 and speak to Dr. Djegini Varghese,
00:21 consultant in Oncoplastic Breast Surgery
00:24 at the Royal Free Hospital.
00:26 Doctor, thank you for speaking to France24.
00:29 Your research focuses on the genetics of breast cancer.
00:33 Can you give us a bit of a summary of what you found?
00:37 - Yeah, so breast cancer is a complex condition.
00:42 There are lots of factors that affect
00:43 our risk of breast cancer.
00:45 And we know about the BRCA1 and the BRCA2 genes,
00:49 which are quite famous, but we also know
00:51 about other high-risk and moderate-risk genes.
00:55 But they explain very little of the familiar risk
00:59 of breast cancer, which is why we now understand
01:02 that breast cancer is actually a polygenic disease,
01:05 which means that a lot of us carry small changes
01:09 within the DNA that increase our risk of breast cancer
01:12 only by a small percentage.
01:14 But if you carry enough of these changes,
01:17 it's possible that we are at a significantly
01:20 higher risk of breast cancer.
01:22 So this is an area where we are learning a lot more,
01:26 and it's becoming very interesting,
01:28 because what we want to do is to predict
01:31 the 30% of our population that is likely
01:34 to get breast cancer, and then implement strategies
01:39 to prevent breast cancer in these populations,
01:41 and also early detection strategies.
01:44 - And could women who carry these genes
01:47 also not have a history of breast cancer in their family,
01:51 and presumably think they're not at risk then?
01:54 - Yeah, that's a very good question,
01:56 because a lot of women who have breast cancer,
01:59 over 50% of women who develop breast cancer
02:02 may not have a family history or any other previous history
02:05 of breast-related problems, which is why we need
02:08 to develop more techniques of identifying
02:10 who is at a higher risk.
02:12 - One of the main points with this October awareness month
02:17 is early detection.
02:20 In my own personal experiences,
02:22 I've seen a number of women who you think
02:24 might be too young to be diagnosed
02:27 being diagnosed with breast cancer,
02:28 and it seems it's getting more and more
02:30 like that every year.
02:31 Is this because of more testing,
02:34 or is something changing in our daily lives?
02:36 - That's a very good question.
02:39 It's actually a combination of both.
02:41 This October month is really important,
02:44 and maintaining a conversation about prevention strategies
02:47 and early detection is crucial,
02:49 because you are right, a lot of young women
02:51 think they're too young to develop breast cancer
02:54 and can completely ignore symptoms.
02:58 So what can we do to prevent breast cancer?
03:01 We should try and maintain a healthy weight,
03:04 increase our physical activity level
03:08 to bring it up to 150 minutes, possibly,
03:11 of moderate strenuous activity in a week.
03:14 We should control our alcohol consumption.
03:17 But then, as you said, there are women
03:18 who've done everything, they lead a healthy lifestyle
03:21 and still go on to develop breast cancer
03:23 for lots of reasons.
03:24 And that is where early detection becomes important.
03:27 And so, and why this is important is,
03:30 if we pick up women who are in stage one,
03:33 or where the cancer is contained within the breast,
03:36 then their survival is as good as 99%
03:38 over the next 10 years.
03:40 But this significantly drops down to 40%
03:44 when it comes down to stage four.
03:46 When we see younger women, what is worrying
03:49 about their diagnosis is, they are more likely
03:51 to develop the aggressive kind of cancers
03:54 that grow really, really quickly.
03:56 And so it's important to spread the message
04:00 and make sure that women are aware
04:02 of the signs of breast cancer.
04:04 They are aware of the reasons for why they would want
04:07 to seek earlier detection strategies like mammograms.
04:10 - Breast Cancer Awareness Month,
04:13 we see these pink ribbons popping up all around the world.
04:16 Are there certain things, if we want to support awareness,
04:21 where should we be putting our money or our attention to?
04:24 - Yeah, so I think this is a calling for all of us.
04:29 It's not just the researchers or the clinicians
04:31 or the patients, we all need to work together.
04:34 And the money will go into group research
04:38 because we need to beat breast cancer.
04:40 It's claimed too many lives.
04:42 We need to understand more about the disease
04:44 and bring this to an end.
04:47 What we also need to do is to have a look around us,
04:51 look at our colleagues and speak to our family
04:54 and see if everyone's taking measures to protect themselves.
04:58 Sometimes it's a good idea to invite someone else
05:00 to come with you to a mammogram visit,
05:02 and then making sure that everyone around you
05:04 is safe as well.
05:06 So let's keep having conversations
05:07 and make sure everyone's seeing the doctor.
05:10 - Excellent points, doctor.
05:11 Thank you very much for your time.
05:12 Dr. Jejini Varghese speaking to us from London.