You are here

  • Home
  • Archive
  • Volume 40, Issue 7
  • Prevalence of family histories of breast cancer in the general population and the incidence of related seeking of health care

Article Text

Article menu
Download PDFPDF
Electronic letters
Prevalence of family histories of breast cancer in the general population and the incidence of related seeking of health care
  1. C E Jacobi1,
  2. M A Jonker2,
  3. N J D Nagelkerke2,
  4. J C van Houwelingen2,
  5. G H de Bock1
  1. 1Department of Medical Decision Making, Leiden University Medcial Centre, Leiden, The Netherlands
  2. 2Department of Medical Statistics, Leiden University Medical Centre, Leiden, The Netherlands
  1. Correspondence to:
 C E Jacobi MSc, Leiden University Medical Centre, Department of Medical Decision Making (J10-S), PO Box 9600, 2300 RC Leiden, The Netherlands; 
 c.e.jacobi{at}lumc.nl

https://doi.org/10.1136/jmg.40.7.e83

Statistics from Altmetric.com

    Request Permissions

    If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.

    Breast cancer is the most widespread cancer in women in western countries, currently accounting for one third of all cancers in women.1,2 The lifetime risk of developing breast cancer is 9% in the United Kingdom,3 10% in The Netherlands,1 and 12% in the United States.4 About 15%–20% of all cases of breast cancer are thought to be familial,5,6 and about 5%–10% of all breast cancers are attributed to the known breast cancer susceptibility genes BRCA1 and BRCA2.7–9

    In most European countries nationwide breast cancer screening programmes are available for women of 50 years and older,10 whereas comprehensive screening for breast cancer in women under the age of 50 has been found cost ineffective. It is widely acknowledged that women who have relatives with breast cancer have an increased risk of developing breast cancer themselves.11,12 Consequently, screening for breast cancer might be advisable and cost effective in the subgroup of women under the age of 50 with a familial predisposition to breast cancer. We therefore started a study on the cost effectiveness of breast cancer screening in women under 50 with a familial predisposition to this cancer. For this study we needed information on the distribution of family histories of breast cancer among women under the age of 50 in the general population who might visit a healthcare doctor with concerns about their family history of breast cancer. Several studies have reported information on the percentage of women with a family history of breast cancer among cases of breast cancer and healthy controls.11 However, no such information is available for the general population. Other researchers have made attempts to gain information on the percentage of women in the general population who might be at an increased risk for …

    View Full Text