CALGARY – The first time Anita Grant heard the words, “you have cancer,” she was just a young woman.
“I developed breast cancer when I was pregnant with a fourth child at age 33.”
Grant wasn’t the only woman in her family to face the disease. Her mother, grandmother, an Aunt and her younger sister had also had either breast or ovarian cancer at some point in their lives. Eventually, Grant learned, her genes were to blame.
“We have recently discovered that 25 per cent of ovarian cancers are related to an abnormality in the BRCA-1 and 2 genes,” Dr. Prafull Ghatage, a gynecological oncologist at Calgary’s Tom Baker Cancer Centre said.
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Women with the BRCA-1 genetic mutation have an up to 60 per cent increased risk of developing ovarian cancer by the time they reach age 70, those with the BRCA-2 mutation have a ten to 20 per cent risk of developing ovarian or fallopian tube cancer.
“For women with these genetic mutations, its possible to offer them some preventive strategies which could include suppressing the ovaries with something like the birth control pill, and then after they’ve completed childbearing, we may consider removing their ovaries,” Ghatage said.
After learning she had tested positive for the BRCA-1 mutation, Grant opted to have a complete hysterectomy to reduce her risk.
According to Ovarian Cancer Canada, every year 2,800 Canadian women are diagnosed with this disease, 55 per cent will die within five years.