Genetic Risk Factors In Breast Cancer
Breast cancer is the most common cancer and the second leading cause of cancer deaths in women in the United States. In 2008, approximately 184,450 patients were estimated to be diagnosed with invasive breast cancer, and an estimated 40,930 were estimated to die of this disease. Furthermore, over 50,000 female carcinoma in situ breast cases would have been diagnosed. The etiology of breast cancer is poorly understood with multiple genetic and environmental factors involved in the initiation and progression of cancer.
Scandinavian Twin Study: For years, there has been a hot debate as to whether the cause of breast cancer is genetic or environmental. Then in 2000, Lichtenstein and his colleagues at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden published their study of 44,788 pairs of twins from the Swedish, Danish, and Finnish twin registries. In this study, they looked at cancer risk with 28 different types of cancers and did statistical modeling of genetic and hereditary contributions in eleven different cancer types. Read more…
Categories: Cancer Tags: Breast, Breast Cancer, Cancer, cancer deaths in women, Hereditary, most common cancer, Risk
