breast cancer genetics

Biological Links Identified Between an Aggressive Breast Cancer Type and African Ancestry

Definitive biological links between African ancestry and disease processes that affect an aggressive cancer type called triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) have been identified by Weill Cornell Medicine investigators. Their analysis of TNBC tumors from a diverse patient population yielded a large set of genes whose expression differed in patients with African ancestry compared with patients […]

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Increased Activity of Two Molecular Networks Could Explain Racial Disparity in Triple Negative Breast Cancer Deaths

Different activity in two molecular networks could help explain why triple negative breast cancers tend to be more aggressive in African American women compared with white American women, a new study from Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center suggests. Dipali Sharma, PhD (above), and her colleagues compared the behavior of triple negative breast cancer cell lines

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DNA damage repair genes behave differently in Black and White women with breast cancer

Differences in the expression of DNA repair genes may help to explain why breast cancer mortality is higher in black women than white women. Researchers compared tumour samples from 144 black women and 703 white women diagnosed with breast cancer, looking at the expression of 104 DNA repair genes previously shown to affect responses to

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Tumor molecular biology more significant than race in breast cancer survival

Race did not significantly predict response to treatment outcomes among women with high-risk breast cancer in a new study of nearly 1,000 women. Beverly Kyalwazi, MD, and her colleagues found that tumor biology more strongly predicted a positive outcome from treatment. Black women who received appropriate therapies based on their tumor profiles saw the same

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Gene mutations linked to breast cancer occur at same rate in Black and White women

Black and White women diagnosed with breast cancer were just as likely to be carrying pathogenc variants in 12 genes linked to a risk of breast cancer in a study of nearly 30,000 women. “A potential reason that past studies showed that Black women who underwent commercial testing had more mutations than white women is

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One in 7 Caribbean-born women diagnosed with breast or ovarian cancer had at least one inherited mutation that raised their risk

In a study of Caribbean women, the Bahamas had the highest proportion of hereditary breast and ovarian cancer (23%). Barbados was second in the percentage of hereditary cancer at almost 18%, followed by Trinidad & Tobago (12%), Dominica (8.8%), Haiti (6.7%), and Cayman Islands (6.3%, and Jamaica ranking as the lowest (4.9%). All in all,

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Breast cancer gene mutations same in Black and White women

The genetic mutations that can increase breast cancer risk are the same for both Black and white women, which means that currently available genetic tests are effective for Black women. Three of the most well-known genes that can mutate and raise the risk of breast and/or ovarian cancer are BRCA1, BRCA2, and PALB2. Women who

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Indigenous American genes may increase risk of aggressive breast cancer

The greater the proportion of ancestry from Indigenous America a Hispanic woman has, the greater the likelihood that she will be diagnosed with HER-2 positive breast cancer, a more aggressive type of the disease. Indigenous Americans are the pre-Columbian peoples of North, Central and South America and their descendants. This ancestry could help account for

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Are Hispanic women second most common group to carry BRCA gene mutations?

Latinas are the second most common ethnic group to carry BRCA1 deleterious mutations, after Ashkenazi Jewish women, among all patients with breast cancer. However, Latinas are less likely to receive genetic counseling education, referrals, and testing services and have the least awareness of genetic testing compared to non-Hispanic whites and other minority populations. Research indicates

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