U.K. breast cancer mortality rates have fallen more than any other major European country, says a study published by the British Medical Journal Group (BMJ) on August 11.
A team of researchers led by Philippe Autier from the International Prevention Research Institute in France, examined changes in breast cancer mortality rates in women living in 30 European countries from 1980 to 2006.
Using World Health Organisation data, mortality rates were calculated for all women and by age group (less than 50 years, 50-69 years, and 70 years and over).
From 1989 to 2006, breast cancer mortality decreased by 20 per cent or more in 15 European countries. In the UK, mortality rates fell by about 30 per cent, more than in any other major European country.
In an accompanying editorial, Valerie Beral and Richard Peto, at the University of Oxford, criticised the way that cancer registration in the UK is recorded.
They have found that defects in registrations make cancer survival rates appear significantly worse than they really are.
By contrast, the registration of death is complete, deaths from breast cancer are well recorded (except at old age), and so population-based mortality trends in middle age are fairly reliable.
The authors call for better data collection to help understand the variations in breast cancer mortality across Europe and action to reduce avoidable breast cancer mortality in central European countries.
They conclude that the rapid decline in UK population-based breast cancer mortality rates in middle age are valid and that failure to make proper allowances for the shortcomings of cancer registration data “may well have led to misleading claims about the supposed inferiority of UK cancer treatment services in general.”
The BMJ helps clinicians and organisations worldwide to improve patient outcomes.
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