Fathers Can Carry the Breast Cancer Gene Mutations, Too

I wrote a couple of years ago about the possibility that men can carry the breast cancer mutation genes BRCA1 and BRCA2.   I hoped that this awareness would lead to men’s family history being questioned more often, to provide improved information on the risk to their daughters.  This doesn’t seem to have happened, yet, according to an online review article from Canada in the journal Lancet Oncology.

About 5-10% of women diagnosed with breast cancer are thought to be in patients with mutations in one of the BRCA suppressor genes that confer a substantial risk for cancer – between 55% to 87% for breast and 20% to 34% for ovarian cancer.  It makes sense for them to have genetic testing, as 50% of them will pass on the BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutations to each child they have.  And genetic testing among such women is now relatively common. 

However, taking a family history of breast or ovarian cancer from a cancer patient’s father is not common, and men are rarely tested for the BRCA mutations.  If this could change, it would mean a better chance of finding young women at risk, so that appropriate tests could be introduced in time to allow treatment leading to a satisfactory result.