Clinicopathological Analysis of Patients with Breast Cancer and Their Families

Background: Breast cancer is one of the most common malignancies among Iranian women; however, its clinicopathological feature is uncertain. We pioneered a genetic counseling program among patients with breast cancer and their families in Isfahan. This is the first report of this program. Methods: This was a descriptive cross-sectional study on women with breast cancer registered in Ala Cancer Control and Prevention Center (ACCPC)during 2014. The women and/or their first/second relatives were enrolled for genetic counseling, then their demographic and clinicopathological data were analyzed using SPSSsoftware.  Results: The records of 258 patients with breast cancer and their families were studied. The mean age of the patients at diagnosis was 44.2 years (range: 25-71 years). Of these, 88 (34.1%) patients had ≤40 years at diagnosis. Only 2 (0.8%) patients were men. Also, 21 (8.1%) out of the 258 patients had died at the time of genetic counseling. Distant metastasis was found in 40 (15.5%) patients at diagnosis. The most common pathological feature of breast tumor was invasive ductal carcinoma (68.2%) and the rarest were sarcoma (0.4%) and papillary carcinoma (0.4%). Triple-negative molecular phenotype breast cancer was reported in 25 (9.7%) patients. Estrogen receptor (ER), progesterone receptor (PR) and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) were negative in 32.2%, 27.1%, and 44.2% of the patients’ tumors, respectively. P53 had been checked in 41.5% of the patients of which about 70.1% were mutant. Overall, 895 cases of cancer were reported  among the patients and their families (3.5 patients per family: range=1-9) of which breast, gastric, and colorectal cancers with an incidence of 43.9%, 8.3% and 5.5%, were the most common malignancies, respectively.  Conclusion: Early-onset breast cancer and positive family history for cancer were seen in a significant proportion of the patients in our center, indicating the importance of genetic counseling among the patients and their families.