Hormonal and genetic risk factors for breast cancer.

Breast cancer is a major cause of female morbidity and mortality worldwide. In this review, we discuss the hormonal and genetic risk factors associated with breast cancer development and describe the currently available models for predicting an individual woman's risk. We highlight three more sophisticated surrogate markers of life-time oestrogen exposure (plasma oestradiol, mammographic breast density, bone mineral density) and propose that these may be used to improve estimates of a woman's absolute risk.