Women's interest in a personal breast cancer risk assessment and lifestyle advice at NHS mammography screening

Background Although mortality from breast cancer is declining, incidence continues to increase and is often detected at routine NHS screening. Most middle aged and older women in England attend for screening every 3 years. Assessing their personal breast cancer risk and providing preventative lifestyle advice could help to further reduce breast cancer incidence. Methods A cross-sectional, self-complete postal survey measured attendees' interest in having a personal risk assessment, expected impact on screening attendance, knowledge of associations between lifestyle and breast cancer and preferred ways of accessing preventative lifestyle advice. Results A total of 1803/4948 (36.4%) completed questionnaires were returned. Most participants (93.7%) expressed interest in a personal risk assessment and 95% (1713/1803) believed it would make no difference or encourage re-attendance. Two-thirds (1208/1803) associated lifestyle with breast cancer, but many were unaware of specific risks such as weight gain, obesity, alcohol consumption and physical inactivity. NHS sourced advice was expected to be more credible than other sources, and booklets, brief counselling or an interactive website were most preferred for accessing this. Conclusions Attendees appear to welcome an intervention that would facilitate more proactive clinical and lifestyle prevention and address critical research gaps in breast cancer prevention and early detection.