Prenatal testing offers a window for finding a mother's cancer risk.

A recent study conducted by researchers from Weill Cornell Medicine, Columbia University Irving Medical Center, and NewYork-Presbyterian suggests that including BRCA1 testing during prenatal carrier screening for pregnant individuals is both cost-effective and beneficial. Harmful variants in the BRCA1 gene significantly increase the risk of breast, ovarian, and pancreatic cancers, but many carriers are unaware of their status until after a cancer diagnosis. The study found that adding BRCA1 testing to prenatal carrier screening could identify at-risk individuals earlier, allowing for cancer screening and preventative strategies that could potentially save lives. The researchers also believe that adding other hereditary cancer genes to prenatal carrier screening could be cost-effective. Currently, no prenatal carrier screening panels on the market include BRCA1 or other hereditary breast and ovarian cancer genes, but the researchers are in talks with genetic testing companies to integrate these genes into their products. [Extracted from the article]

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