Breast Cancer Gene Linked to Ovarian Cancer

Toronto researchers find that women with a genetic predisposition to breast cancer — and are successfully treated — may still be at risk for ovarian cancer.

In hereditary cancer clinics, we see patients with mutations in the BRCA1 or BRCA2 genes who are convinced that since they got breast cancer, they won’t get ovarian cancer, said lead study author Kelly Metcalfe, of the University of Toronto.

It’s not true that having breast cancer lowers the lifetime risk of ovarian cancer for these women.

The women should consider taking preventive measures, such as oophorectomy — removal of the ovaries and fallopian tubes — because they are still at a very high risk of developing ovarian cancer after breast cancer, Metcalfe wrote in January’s Gynecologic Oncology.

The BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutations are present in about one of every 250 women, and more prevalent in women of Ashkenazi Jewish background, said Metcalfe.

Women with either of these genes have up to an 87 percent lifetime risk of developing breast cancer.