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Women who received chest radiation treatment for a rare form of childhood cancer were at an increased risk of developing breast cancer.

According to a study reported in the journal Cancer, exposure to chest radiation for treating Wilms tumor, a rare form of childhood cancer, was associated with increased occurrence of breast cancer in women later. Researchers studied 2,500 young women who had survived Wilms tumor.

Wilms tumor is a nephroblastoma or a cancer of the kidney which can metastasize to lungs. The disease in the lungs is treated with low dose radiation.

The women who were studied were divided into two categories - those who received radiation and those who did not. Researchers found that 20 percent of the women who received radiation had developed breast cancer by the age of 40 years. They also found that those who received radiation were at a higher 4 percent higher risk for developing breast cancer compared to those who had received abdominal radiation but not chest radiation.

However compared to general population, researchers found that those who received chest radiation for Wilms tumor had a 30 percent higher risk of breast cancer.

"Current guidelines call for early screening for breast cancer among survivors of childhood cancer if they have received 20 or more Gray of radiation therapy to breast tissue. This would exclude a large majority of patients who had received whole chest radiation for Wilms tumor. Our results suggest that the risk of early breast cancer among Wilms tumor survivors is sufficiently high that early screening might be considered an option for them also," said Norman Breslow of University of Washington in a press release.

Researchers advised Wilms tumor survivors should begin breast cancer surveillance at the age of 25 years.

"Because compliance with breast cancer surveillance is low in adult survivors of childhood cancer, barriers such as education of both survivors and providers should be addressed and mitigated," the researchers wrote.