Impact of Immigration on Breast Cancer in Migrant Population in the UK

With increasing and changing migration patterns, the risk of breast cancer in the UK’s immigrant population is still unclear. We aim to review the available published evidence on the impact of immigration and breast cancer in the migrant population in the UK. All studies/reviews published are from the UK studies published in the English language. All relevant studies on breast cancer and immigration were identified through Medline/PubMed, which included incidence, mortality, and screening uptake in the immigrant population. We identified 11 (eleven) relevant publications conducted since 1999 until the present date. All publications were from the UK and were mainly retrospective studies. Five out of eleven studies investigated the incidence and mortality of breast cancer in the immigrant population. Four studies looked at the extrinsic and intrinsic factors associated with breast cancer risk in this population, whilst three looked into the immigrant population’s breast screening uptake. Our conclusions highlight an association between immigration and breast cancer amongst the migrant population in the UK but with heterogeneity in the recorded data. We believe that changing demographical patterns of migration and the nature of recorded data that is retrospective and a decade-old does not reflect the accurate picture. Hence, we feel perhaps large-scale present-day research on the impact of immigration on breast cancer is required to assess the actual risks and incidence to improve engagement and provide better outcomes within the immigrant population.