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Cancer Cancer Basics

Non-smoking cancer patients may have a genetic link to cancer.


For men and women who do not smoke, the risk of getting lung cancer may be heavily influenced by their family history of the disease. Researchers from The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center looked at the incidence of lung cancer in 2,465 first-degree relatives of 316 lung cancer patients who had never smoked. They found that these parents, siblings and children had a 25 percent greater risk of getting any type of cancer—including skin, colorectal, head, neck, lung, prostate and breast cancer—than the siblings of a non-smoker who did not have lung cancer. The study also found that these relatives were six-times more likely to develop lung cancer before the age of 50. "This study demonstrates the importance of familial factors in the general development of cancer," said Dr. Olga Gorlova, study author.

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