Experts have found that breast cancer genetics are usually passed from parents onto children. Many breast cancer cases are inherited and that means that means that in order to find a cure experts have to look at breast cancer genetic results.

Understanding Genetics and Breast Cancer

Unless you are an expert then you will probably be completely confused by genetics and breast cancer. It can be fairly complicated and when the term ‘genetic testing for breast cancer’ is mentioned you may feel a little lost.

Basically our breast cancer risk is increased if there are variations of the following genes:

BRCA1
ATM
RAD51
BRCA2
CHEK2

To most people those are just a list of letters and numbers and they do not mean a thing. However, to experts they look at these combinations in order to see whether our genetics have in fact caused our breast cancer. There is certainly a genetic link to breast cancer and it is the genes TP53, AR, DIRAS3 and ERBB2 that are connected to breast cancer.

Basically our genes are responsible for us regulating the growth of our cells. So if there is a variation of genes then our risk of breast cancer increases. Breast cancer genetic testing is a vital part of breast cancer research and it needs to be done to see which type of breast cancer we have. Genetics and familial breast cancer and genetics of sporadic breast cancer will be different hence the fact that genetic testing is essential.

How Breast Cancer is inherited

Each person who has inherited breast cancer will find that their genes are different to that of the next person. This is because there are different variations available and one example could be that the genes BRCA1 and BRCA2 have mutations and only one copy of the gene is needed to increase your chance of developing breast cancer.

However actual breast cancer is not inherited, it is just an increased chance of developing the condition that you inherit. Also not everybody who does inherit faulty genes will develop breast cancer. No expert really knows why some women develop breast cancer and some women don’t. Genetics testing will constantly be carried out until a link can be found. At the moment however all that is known is that some women are at an increased risk of developing breast cancer than others.

Overall there are different types of cancer and our genetics will determine which type we do actually have. There are alternative genetic breast cancer treatments available so do ask your doctor about those if you want to find out more.