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Although oral contraceptives (OCs) have been shown to reduce the risk for epithelial ovarian cancer, the duration of this protective effect has not been clearly defined. Now, investigators have reanalyzed data from 45 case-control and prospective studies (primarily in Europe and the U.S.) including more than 23,000 women with ovarian cancer (cases; mean age at diagnosis, 56) and 87,000 women without the disease (controls). Overall, 31% of the cases and 37% of the controls had used the pill; average duration of OC use was 4.4 and 5.0 years, respectively.
Overall, the relative risk for ovarian cancer in OC ever-users versus never-users was 0.73 (95% confidence interval, 0.70–0.76; P<0.0001). Table 1 shows the estimated absolute risk for ovaria…