Researchers have shown how combinations of genetic variations can contribute to increased cancer risk, it was announced last night.
The Australians researchers say it is the first time anyone has quantified the impact of carrying multiple risk genes for a cancer.
The findings come from a study of sarcoma involving more than 1,000 patients in the International Sarcoma Kindred Study.
The study led the researchers to mutations in genes such as ERCC2, ATR, BRCA2 and ATM contributing to cancer risk.
But they also showed how carrying two or three risk genes increased risk even more.
The findings have been reported in The Lancet Oncology.
Researcher Professor David Thomas, of the Garvan Institute of Medical Research, Sydney, said: "This is the first time – in any cancer – that anyone has quantified the effect of multiple rare genetic mutations on cancer risk.
"Until now, we’ve been limited to single-gene thinking, so we tell patients, for instance, that carrying a BRCA1 mutation means their breast cancer risk is higher, or that their risk of sarcoma and other cancers is higher if they’ve got a particular mutation in the p53 gene.
"The study shows us that the landscape of cancer risk is far more complex than that. We can now see that the risk for developing sarcoma is increased through the combined effect of multiple genes, and that the more mutations someone carries, the earlier the onset of cancer."
He added: "For about a third of the individuals we studied, the gene mutations they carry give us important information about how regularly they should be monitored and how they should or should not be treated.
"To give one example, the ERCC2 gene is involved in detoxifying chemotherapeutic agents – so for those individuals who carry an ERCC2 mutation, chemotherapy may not be an appropriate treatment.
"And for individuals carrying a BRCA2 mutation, we now know that they are at risk of sarcoma as well as breast and ovarian cancer – which also brings into play new treatment approaches."
Lancet Oncology 4 August 2016; doi: 10.1016/S1470-2045(16)30147-4
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