PCOS and Cancer Risk

I have PCOS and my father has prostate cancer. I'm 25, and concerned about my increased cancer risk throughout my life. Mostly, I'm worried about knowing what to do to catch any cancer early. While it's unlikely I will get cancer in my 20s, as I get older, it becomes more and more likely.

It has been demonstrated in numerous studies that women who have not achieved a pregnancy have two to three times the risk of developing endometrial cancer compared to women who have been pregnant. Anovulatory cycles result in chronic estrogen exposure to the endrometrial lining and an increased risk of developing cancer.

Women who are 21 to 50 pounds overweight have a three fold increase in the risk of endometrial cancer. And diabetes increases a woman's risk of developing endometrial cancer by greater than two fold.

What worries me most is that routine pap smears are inadequate for screening purposes. Transvaginal ultrasound as a screen for endometrial cancer is also of questionable value in finding the cancer in women who do not have periods.

Approximately 90 percent of women with endometrial cancer have vaginal bleeding or discharge as their only presenting complaint.