Researchers said women in developed countries survive roughly 10 years longer after a breast cancer diagnosis compared to women in poor-to-middle-income countries.
The study by University of Michigan demonstrates the lack of access to good health care faced by women in poor countries, said the study's principal investigator Rajesh Balkrishnan, an associate professor at the U-M schools of Pharmacy and Public Health.
Early diagnosis and sustained treatment were the biggest hurdles and also the main indicators of patient survival, he said.
Balkrishnan and colleagues looked at roughly 300 women in the southern rural district of Udupi, India. Patients received one of three chemotherapy drug regimens depending on the stage of cancer.
Only about 27 per cent of patients were diagnosed in the early stages of cancer, and they survived an average of 11 years. The majority of patients were diagnosed in later or advanced stages, and they survived from about one to two-and-a-half years after diagnosis and treatment.
Many diagnoses occur at later stages because screening isn't available in those rural areas, Balkrishnan said. Fear, poverty and ignorance about breast cancer also delay treatment and diagnosis.
And, if the diagnosis does come early, access and use of breast cancer chemotherapy treatments