Reproduction after breast cancer

Abstract

Breast cancer is the most frequently occurring cancer in women of developed countries, and as a result of new developments in breast cancer treatment, more women are cured after being diagnosed with this disease. It is important that fertility preservation strategies are addressed before chemotherapy, because chemotherapy may induce premature ovarian failure (depending on the woman's age, the drugs used, the dosage and duration of treatment). Among possible solutions are embryos or oocytes cryopreservation, ovarian tissue cryopreservation-freezing with a subsequent orthotopic and heterotopic autotransplantation, whole ovary cryopreservation, ovarian suppression with gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) analogues, which inhibit ovarian follicular depletion induced by chemotherapeutic agents and in vitro fertilisation (IVF) after ovulation induction with aromatase inhibitors or tamoxifen.