Practical issues in counseling healthy women about their breast cancer risk and use of tamoxifen citrate.

Advances in the detection and medical and surgical treatment of breast cancer have caught the attention of the media and the public. Such widespread media attention has been a mixed blessing, however; the anxiety engendered may actually lead to poorer compliance with breast cancer screening recommendations and may jeopardize early detection. Despite being better informed, many women seem to fatalistically await the development of breast cancer.