When going to the hospital, doctors often ask if anyone else in the family has had breast cancer and call it a family history. Why is it important to know this? The reason is that if another member of the family has breast cancer, the chances of developing breast cancer may be higher for the person themselves than for those without a family history. Knowing the risk of the disease can help people make decisions about their health. For example, some women may decide to take extra steps to prevent breast cancer because they are in a high-risk group for breast cancer, such as frequent checkups and surgical prophylactic removal of the breast.
How much does family history affect a person’s risk of developing breast cancer, really? Find out.
What is family history?
What is family history?
First, it’s important to clarify what family history is. A family history is a history of illness in a family member. The doctor needs to be clear about whether one or more members of the family have the disease, whether they are still alive or have died, whether they are very close to the person who is seen, such as parents, sisters, brothers, and children, or whether they are less close, such as aunts, uncles, nieces/nephews, nieces/nephews, grandparents, or even cousins.
Many people may have trouble remembering information about the illnesses of some family members, so please try to recall as much as possible. The more information you can provide about your relatives, the more helpful it will be to identify your family history and determine your risk for breast cancer.
How much does family history affect?
How much family history affects a person’s risk of developing breast cancer is related to the following factors.
- Whether the member with breast cancer is closely related to their own relatives; the closer the relatives, the higher their own risk of developing the disease. Parents, sisters, brothers and children are among the closest relatives, and these members are called first-degree relatives.
- The number of members of the family who have breast cancer, the greater the number, the higher one’s risk of developing the disease.
- The age of a relative at the time of breast cancer diagnosis, if diagnosed before age 50, increases one’s own risk of developing the disease.
- A family history of ovarian cancer along with a family history of breast cancer increases the risk of the disease.
- Having a male breast cancer patient in your family increases your own risk of developing the disease.
How to identify the impact of family history?
The best way to find out your risk for breast cancer is to consult your doctor. Your doctor will ask for information about at least three generations of relatives, including if they had cancer, what type of cancer they had, how old they were when they were diagnosed, and if they died, what the age of death was.
Doctors may also recommend consulting with a genetic counselor who is specially trained to help people understand their risk of developing breast cancer. Genetic counseling may be followed by genetic testing to further clarify the risk by detecting mutations in some genes that are associated with the development of breast cancer.