Authors' recommendations: Ovarian cancer is the fifth most common cancer in women and usually presents at an advanced stage with a poor prognosis. More than 15,000 American women will have died of ovarian cancer in 2012 and over 22,000 women will have been diagnosed with the disease. Ninety percent of ovarian cancers are epithelial in origin (epithelial ovarian cancer [EOC]), starting in the cells that cover the outer layer of the ovary. In the general population, the lifetime risk for a woman to be diagnosed with EOC is 1 in 71. At least 10% of EOC is thought to be hereditary; the remainder is considered sporadic (nonhereditary). Currently, many hereditary cases of EOC are associated with variants in the breast cancer 1 (BRCA1) and breast cancer 2 (BRCA2) tumor suppressor genes and are part of the hereditary breast and ovarian cancer syndrome (HBOC). However, variants in BRCA1 and BRCA2 account for less than half of the cases of hereditary EOC. In the absence of reliable methods of early detection for EOC and given the poor prognosis of advanced EOC, risk-reducing salpingo-oophorectomy (RRSO) is recommended to women with a known hereditary susceptibility to EOC (e.g., BRCA1 and BRCA2 carriers) once childbearing is complete. RRSO reduces the risk of ovarian cancer by 90% to 95%. Despite multiple attempts to identify other genetic variants associated with EOC risk, many cases of hereditary EOC remain unexplained. In 2010, a germline single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) located in the 3' untranslated region (UTR) of the Kristen rat sarcoma (KRAS) oncogene was reported to be a new genetic marker for susceptibility to EOC. The rs61764370 SNP is known as the KRAS-variant. The KRAS-variant, which disrupts a microRNA (miRNA) binding site, is thought to be a functional SNP as it has been associated with increased KRAS expression. Clinical testing for the KRAS-variant, called PreOvar, is commercially available through Mira Dx Inc. This report focuses on assessment of the PreOvar test as a genetic marker for EOC susceptibility.

Project Status: Completed

Year Published: 2013

URL for published report: The report may be purchased from:http://www.hayesinc.com/hayes/crd/?crd=14827

English language abstract: An English language summary is available

Publication Type: Not Assigned

Country: United States

Organisation Name: HAYES, Inc.

Contact Address: 157 S. Broad Street, Suite 200, Lansdale, PA 19446, USA. Tel: 215 855 0615; Fax: 215 855 5218

Contact Name: saleinfo@hayesinc.com

Contact Email: saleinfo@hayesinc.com

Copyright: 2013 Winifred S. Hayes, Inc