Hanging in there: exploring the heritability of breast cancer survival

Abstract

Breast cancer is one of the leading causes of cancer death in women worldwide. Survival after diagnosis varies greatly between patients even when the tumor characteristics aresimilar. Familial studies have shown that relatives with breast cancer tend to have similar prognosis, indicating that breast cancer survival might have a heritable component. Moreover,candidate genes studies have identified prognostic roles for germline mutated genes such as BRCA1/2 and pharmacogenomic studies have explored how germline mutations might affect treatment. Nonetheless, the role of common germline variants on breast cancer survival is still unclear. In this thesis, we aimed exploring the association between common germline variants and breast cancer survival.LUMC / Geneeskund