Dr Simon Crouch is from the Jack Brockhoff Child Health and
Wellbeing Program at the McCaughey Vichealth Centre for
Community Wellbeing. Professor John Hopper, Director of Research
from the Centre for Molecular, Environmental, Genetic and
Analytic Epidemiology at the University of Melbourne, a lead
investigator in the study, said these are surprising and novel
findings which could be pointing to the existence of a new
cancer genetic syndrome. “The results suggest there could
possibly be undiscovered genes causing breast cancer in these
young women, and perhaps other cancers in their families,”
Professor Hopper said. Every year in Australia, more than 300
women are diagnosed with breast cancer before the age of 35
years. This is approximately one in 40 of all breast cancers. In
the largest population based study of its kind, scientists
studied 2200 parents and siblings of 500 women diagnosed with
breast cancer before the age of 35 from across three countries,
Australia, Canada and the United States. After excl