! These families have multiple family members with the same or related cancers.

The cancers tend to occur at younger than average ages (usually <50 years). Also, there is often a history of persons who developed two or more separate cancers; i.e., colon cancer in a breast cancer survivor, bilateral cancers (bilateral breast cancer), or multifocal cancers (two or more cancers in the same organ such as two separate colon cancers). Families with inherited cancer often have cancer in two or more generations with cancer displaying an autosomal dominant pattern of inheritance. In other words, when a parent has inherited predisposition to cancer, each child has a 50/50 (one in two) chance of inheriting the predisposition. Those in the family that inherit the predisposition have a high chance of developing the associated cancers. Those who do not inherit the predisposition are not at increased cancer risk. Genetic testing can often be benecial in determining who in the family has an increased cancer risk. In most cases, it is important to test a relative with cancer rst, to see if a causative mutation can be identied, before testing relatives who have not had cancer.! ! ! "Features of Inherited Cancer." - Information About Cancer. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Mar. 2014.