Most people with a hereditary cancer gene mutation don't know it- and neither did I until I demanded update testing.

This is part one of a series on genetic testing. Why it is important, why we are not optimizing its use, and why patients are often reluctant to do it and then to act on the results. Hint: it has a lot to do with fear, lack of clinician education, and misinformation. More on the fear in part two.

Genetic testing for hereditary cancer has been available for over 30 years. Yet an estimated 97% of people who carry a high-risk mutation, like BRCA1, BRCA2, PALB2, or Lynch syndrome genes, still don’t know. Family history forms are incomplete, and referrals don’t happen. Testing from a decade ago may have missed entire categories of risk.