Cancer survivors far less likely to conceive, new research says

Women who survive cancer are more than a third less likely to conceive than other women, research suggests.

New data from more than 23,000 female cancer survivors in Scotland found a 38% reduction in conception compared to the general population.

All the women were diagnosed with cancer as children or when they were under the age of 39.

The research, which has not yet been published in a medical journal, was presented at the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology (ESHRE) conference in Geneva.

Experts examined data for all types of cancer and found a detrimental effect on fertility across the board but particularly in cervical, breast and leukaemia patients.

Cancer and its treatment is known to affect fertility in several ways, including chemotherapy and radiotherapy damaging the ovaries.

Radiotherapy may also affect parts of the brain which control reproduction.

Professor Richard Anderson, from Queen’s Medical Research Institute at Edinburgh University, who led the study, said: “The major impact on pregnancy after some common cancers highlights the need for enhanced strategies to preserve fertility in girls and young women.”

The study looked at data for 23,201 female cancer survivors, who had 6,627 pregnancies.

Experts said almost 11,000 would have been expected in a comparable matched control group from the general population.

For women who had not been pregnant before their cancer diagnosis, 21% achieved a pregnancy after their diagnosis compared with 39% in a control group. This means those women with cancer were about half as likely to fall pregnant for the first time as other women.

The study also found women diagnosed later on (2005-2012) had better chances of pregnancy than those diagnosed earlier in the study (1981-1988).