OBJECTIVES: To determine the predictors of breast cancer patients' (BCPs) willingness to accept local and systemic therapy. METHODS: Cross-sectional survey of BCPs ages 36-80 at the University of Maryland Greenebaum Cancer Center, Baltimore, MD. Since “treatment” is considered a “short-term” health state, the chained procedure for the time trade-off (TTO) was used to assess TTO. Willingness to accept therapy was determined using “minimum cancer-free years to accept therapy” (CFYs) as the dependent variable. The number of CFYs was calculated based upon BCPs TTO responses for mastectomy (MRM), breast-conserving therapy (BCT), chemotherapy (CTX) and tamoxifen (TAM). Demographic and clinical data were abstracted from medical records. Tobit regression models were used for multivariate analyses. RESULTS: Mean age=56.0 years (SD±9.43, n=77); 58.2% were white; 75.6% had early stage cancer. BCPs required more CFYs (median=4) to accept MRM than to accept BCT, CTX, or TAM (median 1 year for each). For all forms of therapy, the mode=0, suggesting that BCPs were willing to accept therapy even if it provided no additional CFYs. Late stage patients required more CFYs to accept TAM (ß=6.61, p=0.0489); similarly late stage patients in good physical health required more CFYs to have MRM (ß=0.50, p=0.0322). Treatment-experienced BCPs were more willing to accept that type of therapy than those who were treatment-naïve. Younger patients (<65) required fewer CFYs to accept chemotherapy (age group 50-54, ß=-4.77, p=0.0403; 55-59, ß=-7.25, p=0.0019). Being non-white and having less education were associated with requiring fewer CFYs to accept to accept CTX (ß=-3.86, p=0.0087; ß=-5.10, p=0.0193, respectively). CONCLUSION: BCPs required relatively few CFYs to accept treatment. Willingness-to-accept fewer CFYs for CTX among those with less education and of younger age is consistent with treatment patterns previously-published. The fact that non-whites (primarily African Americans) required fewer CFYs to accept CTX appears in contrast to observed underutilization of CTX among African American BCPs.