Patient Question: Description:My grandmother had ovarian cancer in her early 60s and my father had liver cancer at the age of 43, and no one else in my family has had cancer in three generations. I am 46 years old and in good health. I would like to know if I am at high risk of cancer. Do I belong to a family with LFS syndrome? Doctor: Let’s start with some basic knowledge about tumor genetics. Tumor is a common disease, and the development of tumor is the result of the interaction between genetic factors and environmental factors. Therefore, there are two possibilities when there are multiple tumors in a family: living together in an environment with cancer-causing factors, or due to having different degrees of genetic susceptibility to tumors. It is generally believed that if the age of onset of cancer is below 50 years old, genetic factors are usually considered to exist, and the younger the age of onset, the stronger the genetic susceptibility to cancer; while for those who have onset of cancer above 50 years old, environmental factors are mostly dominant, and the older the age of onset, the greater the role of environmental factors. The hereditary susceptibility of a family depends on the proximity of the blood relationship between cancer patients and themselves, the number of cancer patients and their age at the time of onset of cancer. If there are no obvious environmental carcinogenic factors, your family members should be more susceptible to cancer, but whether cancer occurs depends on whether you have inherited the cancer susceptibility gene, whether there are carcinogenic factors in the environment, and whether your lifestyle is healthy. As for whether it is LFS syndrome (Li-Fraumeni syndrome), we should first understand the characteristics of LFS, which is a rare, autosomal dominant disorder that significantly increases cancer susceptibility, with a spectrum of tumors including sarcoma, breast cancer, leukemia and adrenocortical carcinoma. Predisposing individuals develop cancer before the age of 45 years, and p53 gene mutations are present in most patients. Based on the above characteristics, your family is not typical of LFS, but you can go to a unit that has the conditions to check for the presence of p53 gene mutation, which will help to make a clearer conclusion, and also may identify cancer susceptible individuals for prevention. Patient question: What cancer prevention measures should I take in my case? Do I have cancer if I have cancer susceptibility gene? Also, I don’t fully understand the statement that most patients with cancer before the age of 45 have P53 mutation, can you explain it? Thank you very much! Doctor: Regarding how you can prevent cancer, it can be summarized into several aspects: good psychological state, don’t have excessive psychological burden, cope with optimism; eat more healthy and green anti-cancer diet, less fried and baked smoked and pickled food; try to avoid various cancer-causing factors in life; have a healthy lifestyle, quit smoking and less alcohol, don’t overwork and indulge, actively work out to enhance immunity. For more detailed advice, it is more appropriate to consult relevant experts. In layman’s terms, a pre-documented person is a cancer patient who is first diagnosed in your family line, and if it is familial, the age of onset is usually below 45 years old. Theoretically, every cancer has cancer-related gene alterations, but not all, high-risk cancer-related genes in cancer families have been studied clearly, and only a few cancer-related genes can be clinically detected at present. p53, mentioned in the suggestion, is the high-risk cancer-related gene of LFS you have consulted, which may have some reference value for you.