Genetics of Breast Cancer in Blacks
Abstract
Breast cancer in young Black women is more virulent, leading to a decrease in the overall survival rates for African Americans diagnosed with breast cancer when compared to Whites. Our studies provide the first concerted effort to seriously address the contribution of genetic risk factors to the high incidence and mortality from breast cancer in young Black women. We have developed an efficient mechanism to recruit incident cases of early onset breast cancer with the goal of enrolling 75 - 100 new cases per year from Nigeria and 50 - 75 cases per year in the US. We have used the Chronic Disease Network -- a collaborative framework for the study of international comparisons among black populations -- to develop this infrastructure and we are now awaiting approval of our clinical protocol by the Human Subject Review Committee. In the next year, we will optimize our mutation detection assay using Denaturing High Performance Liquid Chromatography. We will recruit and analyze 200 U.S. Black women diagnosed with breast cancer at, or before, age 40, for BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutations and compare the incidence and spectrum of mutations to that seen in a matched cohort of African women.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Sep 01, 2001
- Accession Number
- ADA399350
Entities
People
- Olufunmilayo I. Olopade
Organizations
- University of Chicago