You may be having a strong family history of breast cancer, but that doesn"t mean that you have an increased risk of ovarian cancer. Women who have BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutations have an increased risk of both breast cancer and ovarian cancer, but not women with strong family history of breast cancer, who do not possess BRCA mutations.
BRCA mutations are associated with increased risk of breast cancer and ovarian cancer and these women may have up to 45 percent chance of developing ovarian cancer in her lifetime. By comparison only about 1.8 percent of women without an inherited BRCA abnormality get ovarian cancer.
It's known that up to 50 percent of families with a strong history of breast cancer don't have mutations in either BRCA1 or BRCA2.
In the latest study, researchers at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City studied 199 families that experienced multiple cases of breast cancer, but whose members were not identified as BRCA mutation carriers. Their findings are reported in the recent issue of Journal of the National Cancer Institute, the researchers concluded that the women in the study group weren't at any increased risk of ovarian cancer compared to women without a family history of breast cancer. |
