9th World Congress on Breast Cancer and Therapies

IS BREAST CANCER DIAGNOSIS VIA text message next? A new study finds women with breast cancer are increasingly likely to receive their diagnoses by phone rather than a face-to-face conversation with their doctor.

Nearly 60 per cent of women now learns of their breast cancer diagnoses by phone, compared to one-quarter of women in 2007.

Women who received the news over that phone were more likely to have family and friends identified as support members and were somewhat more likely to have localized breast cancer, rather than invasive or spreading cancer. A few women in the study had requested to receive a phone diagnosis.

An earlier study found a mismatch between women's preferences and the reality of how they received their breast cancer diagnoses. Of about 785 breast cancer survivors, only 39 per cent were given the diagnosis face-to-face, although half of the participants would have chosen that method.
For many women in that study, avoiding suspense was important, with more than 80 per cent preferring to receive their cancer biopsy results within two days. However, only 40 per cent of participants found out their results that quickly.