Breast Cancer Awareness | Surgeons see increase of genetic instances of disease – Meadville Tribune

During the past several years, area surgeons have seen an increase in the number of women with breast cancer who have gene mutations.

Dr. Patti Ann Stefanick, breast surgeon, said a growing number of the cases that she sees in her practice are a result of gene-positive breast cancer.

Id say 10 percent come in that are gene-positive and there are some people that come in that dont know theyre gene-positive, but we can almost pick them out in the schedule, she said.

For example, we have a lady were going to see ... And we just talked about it earlier that they should have gene testing, because her sister, we know, had breast cancer, her mother had breast cancer and now shes a new diagnosis and I dont think anybody in the family has had it yet. So shes a prime example. She needs to have gene testing.

Stefanick added that more insurance plans are covering the cost of testing, which makes the process easier.

Dr. Dan Clark of the Indiana Regional Medical Center said he became a genetics counselor more than 11 years ago after his wife was diagnosed with breast cancer and he left her genetics counseling appointment with more questions than answers.

Clark said that originally the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes were thought to cause breast cancer.

Eleven genes are now evaluated for mutations.

Clark said he sees a lot of referrals for those who may be at genetic risk.

Some area surgeons are noticing more and more instances of breast cancer in women, but many say it is due to early detection.

Overall, a womans risk throughout her lifetime of getting breast cancer is about 12 percent, said Dr. Meaghan Marley of Conemaugh East Hills.

So now that more women are getting screened, were just catching that 12 percent now a little bit better, since more and more women are getting screened.

So I dont think necessarily the cancer incidence is going up. Its just out, were catching it now. Were just now catching it a little better, a little earlier.

Dr. Rene Arlow of Conemaugh East Hills said increased screening efforts for patients track nearly one dozen genes.

I think we are screening more, weve become much more liberal with whom we screened, and were picking up a lot more.

And then there are a lot of people that opt for the high-risk screening with breast MRI instead of the mastectomy.

I think were really seeing both and its now that we have so many genes, its a very individualized one gene carries a much higher risk than another factor in patient preference and patient age and that sort of thing, she said.

Katie Smolen is a reporter for The (Johnstown) Tribune-Democrat, which, like The Meadville Tribune, is owned by CNHI.

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Katie Smolen is a reporter with The Tribune-Democrat. Follow her on Twitter @KSmolen1230.

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Breast Cancer Awareness | Surgeons see increase of genetic instances of disease - Meadville Tribune