news report Oct 2009: ASCO Breast: Hereditary Cancer Diagnosed Earlier

Too few second-generation women had been born in the 1930s to analyze a trend, but second-generation women born in every subsequent decade at least tended to have an earlier age at breast cancer diagnosis than their affected relatives:

* For those born in the 1940s, age at onset averaged 46.5 (range 32 to 57), versus 50 (range 32 to 68) in the prior generation (P=0.13).
* For those born in the 1950s, age at onset averaged 43.5 (range 20 to 53), versus 50 (range 33 to 70) in the prior generation (P<0.001).
* For those born in the 1960s, age at onset averaged 38.5 (range 21 to 43) , versus 39.5 (range 23 to 64) in the prior generation (P=0.03).
* For those born in the 1970s, age at onset averaged 31 (range 25 to 35), versus 44.5 (range 34 to 64) in the prior generation (P<0.001).

The researchers cautioned that recall bias related to age at diagnosis may have limited the results, along with inability to test whether all breast and ovarian cancers were correctly attributed to BRCA mutations in the older generations.