Treatments for the types of cancer that affect children have become more effective over recent decades. As a result, an increasing number of people have survived childhood cancer. Unfortunately, survivors of childhood cancer are at risk for developing cancer again during adulthood. Sometimes, but not always, these second occurrences of cancer are the result of the cancer treatments they received as a child. Women who survived childhood or adolescent Hodgkin's disease (a cancer of the lymph nodes) have a higher risk for breast cancer than the general population of women. Radiation treatment to the chest is part of Hodgkin's disease treatment, and it clearly increases the risk for breast cancer later in life. However, reports also suggest that women who survived other types of childhood cancer may also be at risk for breast cancer. Better information about the factors that increase the risk for breast cancer among women who survived childhood cancer might help guide breast cancer screening in these women.