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Prophylactic mastectomy may provide substantial gains in life
expectancy for women with cancer-disposing genes Genetic tests
now enable women to be tested for mutations in the BRCA1 and
BRCA2 genes that markedly increase their risk of breast and
ovarian cancer. The cumulative risk of breast cancer women with
these mutations is estimated to range from 40 to 85 percent
compared with 12 percent among the general population of women,
and from 5 percent to 60 percent (depending on the population
studied) for ovarian cancer, compared with 1.5 percent of women
in the general Inten