Description
Is this the test for me?
This is for you if you:
- are concerned about inherited cancers
- have one or more relatives diagnosed with cancers
- had cancer diagnosis
- are worried about cancers in the family will affect your children
What are ten cancers?
Here is the list of ten cancers:
Breast
for men and women
Ovarian
for women
Uterine
for women
Prostate
for men
Hereditary diffuse gastric cancer
Kidney/Renal
Thyroid
Melanoma
Colorectal
Pancreatic
Yes, it is easy. We will post a saliva collection kit and a return envelope to your home via Postnord. You simply spit saliva into the collection tube. If you need help, instructions are enclosed in the kit. Once you have collected saliva, you place the kit in the return envelope, which has a paid return label. You can then drop off the envelope at any Postnord service point.
The only other thing you need to do is to provide your details and your family’s medical history. The tools on our website will help you easily input the information. It is okay if you don’t provide your family medical history because you don’t know or you prefer not to.
The risk for ten cancers is mapped out by using the proven risk models and reference risk estimation data that are recommended in Swedish national guidelines. The below information is used as input to the mapping:
- Your genetic test results. You will find more information in the section ‘What technology is behind the test?’
- Your family medical history. Given the limitation of the current genomic science, your genetic test data alone cannot predict all risks. The family’s medical history contains much hereditary information. In some cases, family history alone can predict hereditary cancer risk. Therefore family medical history is used as part of the input.
- Information on you and your medical history. Personal information such as ethnicity and ancestry roots have an impact on our hereditary risks. Your lifestyle and medical history affect the risk level.
Note that the risks we report are hereditary risks. That is the risk that you inherited from your biological parents.
Behind the test, it is one of the most advanced technologies called Whole Exome Sequence (WES). First, your saliva sample is analysed, and all the germline DNAs that are responsible for generating your proteins are captured. ‘Germline’ means only the DNAs that you inherited from your parents at the time of conception. Then the analysis searches for any pathogenic gene changes (called variants) in the DNA data (i.e. your whole exome data).
In our report, we include 43 genes known to cause a highly increased risk of developing cancers. The selection of these 43 genes is based on Swedish National Guidelines.
Because germline DNA remains the same during a person’s lifetime, you do not need to take another genetic test for your whole exome data. As genomic science and cancer prevention measures are constantly being discovered, you can enjoy these new advancements without taking another test.
First of all, it is important to understand that the risk is the likelihood of developing cancer:
- Risk is not a diagnosis.
- Some people with high risk never have cancer.
- Similarly, people with low risk can still develop cancer.
Second, You can take action and be empowered by preventive measures. The report will inform you of proactive options available in Sweden. For many cancers, over 90% (close to 100% for breast cancers) survive if discovered early. The healthcare system has a number of monitoring programs to discover cancers early. We’ll inform you how to enter the Swedish healthcare system. There are also preventive healthcare partners that we can recommend to you.
