Diseases
Inherited cancer mutation is common in America
By Ben Wasserman
Apr 17, 2008 - 1:10:25 PM

TURSDAY April 17, 2008 (foodconsumer.org) -- Researchers found an inherited gene mutation responsible for the most common form of colon cancer is more widespread than thought.

The American Founder Mutation is known to cause the North America of Lynch syndrome, a hereditary cancer syndrome that greatly increases the risk of developing cancers of the colon, uterus and ovaries in the gene carriers.

The researchers from Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center and Creighton University estimated that 32,150 Americans carry the mutation compared to an early estimated figure of 18,981.

The results were published recently in the journal Cancer Research.

The mutation was first discovered in 2003. Initial investigation into nine families with the mutation led researchers to conclude that a German immigrant couple brought the mutation to North America in 1727.

An additional study of 32 families suggested that the mutation is actually about 500 years old, meaning that it might arise several generations earlier in Europeans or in Native Americans.

In the United States, people carrying the mutation are clustered in Kentucky, Ohio and Texas.

"The increased age of the American Founder Mutation means that it is significantly more prevalent in the United States than previously thought," said principal investigator Albert de la Chapelle with Ohio State’s Human Cancer Genetics program.

"Of interest is that this mutation has not been found in Europe, which is tentative evidence, along with hints from family histories, that it may have arisen in a Native American."

"This is an important public health concern," de la Chapelle said, "because individuals with a Lynch syndrome mutation can benefit from earlier and more frequent cancer surveillance."

De la Chapelle said a simple, cheap DNA test can reveal whether or not you carry the mutation.

Lynch syndrome, also known as hereditary nonpolyposis colon cancer, accounts for about one third of hereditary colon cancers, and almost 3 percent of overall colon cancer cases, or about 4,500 cases annually in the United States.