With breast self-exam fallen from favour, how can women reduce their risk of breast cancer? [Video]

For years, physicians recommended women perform monthly self-examinations to check for potentially cancerous breast lumps. 

Research, however, suggests breast self-exams don’t have a meaningful effect on breast cancer survival rates and groups like the Canadian Task Force on Preventive Health Care actively recommend against telling women to regularly perform breast self-exams because they can lead to unnecessary biopsies. 

“We know that there is no data that shows, when it comes to breast cancer, it changes your outcome with that,” said Dr. Mojola Omole, president of the Black Physicians Association of Ontario and a surgical oncologist at Scarborough Health Network, speaking with The Dose host Dr. Brian Goldman. 

Nonetheless, Omole says that — along with understanding your risk and going for regular mammography as soon as it’s available in your area, self-exams are still useful. That’s because they provide women with important information about their bodies by making them aware of what feels and looks normal.