Trends in incidence, prevalence, and survival of breast cancer in the United Kingdom from 2000 to 2021

Nicola L. Barclay, Edward Burn, Antonella Delmestri, Talita Duarte-Salles, Asieh Golozar, Wai Yi Man, Eng Hooi Tan, Ilona Tietzova, OPTIMA Consortium, Daniel Prieto-Alhambra*, Danielle Newby

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Breast cancer is the most frequently diagnosed cancer in females globally. However, we know relatively little about trends in males. This study describes United Kingdom (UK) secular trends in breast cancer from 2000 to 2021 for both sexes. We describe a population-based cohort study using UK primary care Clinical Practice Research Datalink (CPRD) GOLD and Aurum databases. There were 5,848,436 eligible females and 5,539,681 males aged 18+ years, with ≥ one year of prior data availability in the study period. We estimated crude breast cancer incidence rates (IR), prevalence and survival probability at one-, five- and 10-years after diagnosis using the Kaplan–Meier method. Analyses were further stratified by age. Crude IR of breast cancer from 2000 to 2021 was 194.4 per 100,000 person-years for females and 1.16 for males. Crude prevalence in 2021 was 2.1% for females and 0.009% for males. Both sexes have seen around a 2.5-fold increase in prevalence across time. Incidence increased with age for both sexes, peaking in females aged 60–69 years and males 90+. There was a drop in incidence for females aged 70–79 years. From 2003–2019, incidence increased > twofold in younger females (aged 18–29: IR 2.12 in 2003 vs. 4.58 in 2018); decreased in females aged 50–69 years; and further declined from 2015 onwards in females aged 70–89 years. Survival probability for females after one-, five-, and ten-years after diagnosis was 95.1%, 80.2%, and 68.4%, and for males 92.9%, 69.0%, and 51.3%. Survival probability at one-year increased by 2.08% points, and survival at five years increased by 5.39% from 2000–2004 to 2015–2019 for females, particularly those aged 50–70 years. For males, there were no clear time-trends for short-term and long-term survival probability. Changes in incidence of breast cancer in females largely reflect the success of screening programmes, as rates rise and fall in synchronicity with ages of eligibility for such programmes. Overall survival from breast cancer for females has improved from 2000 to 2021, again reflecting the success of screening programmes, early diagnosis, and improvements in treatments. Male breast cancer patients have worse survival outcomes compared to females, highlighting the need to develop male-specific diagnosis and treatment strategies to improve long-term survival in line with females.

Original languageEnglish
Article number19069
Number of pages16
JournalScientific Reports
Volume14
Issue number1
Early online date30 Jul 2024
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 17 Aug 2024

Bibliographical note

Professor Daniel Prieto-Alhambra\u2019s research group has received research grants from the European Medicines Agency from the Innovative Medicines Initiative from Amgen Chiesi and from UCB Biopharma; and consultancy or speaker fees (paid to his department) from Astellas Amgen Astra Zeneca and UCB Biopharma. NLB is Director of Sleep Universal Limited (though this work is in no way connected to the present manuscript). All other authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Data Availability Statement

This study is based in part on data from the Clinical Practice Research Datalink (CPRD) obtained under licence from the UK Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency. The data is provided by patients and collected by the NHS as part of their care and support. The interpretation and conclusions contained in this study are those of the author/s alone. Patient level data used in this study was obtained through an approved application-the CPRD (application number 22_001843) and is only available following an approval process-safeguard the confidentiality of patient data. Details on how to apply for data access can be found at https://cprd.com/data-access.

Keywords

  • Humans
  • United Kingdom/epidemiology
  • Female
  • Middle Aged
  • Aged
  • Male
  • Incidence
  • Adult
  • Breast Neoplasms/epidemiology
  • Prevalence
  • Aged, 80 and over
  • Adolescent
  • Young Adult
  • Breast Neoplasms, Male/epidemiology
  • Survival Rate

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