A study comparing DNA and RNA data from Nigerian breast cancer patients to patients in a United States database found that certain aggressive molecular features were far more prevalent in tumors from Nigerian women than in black or white American women.
In the Oct. 16, 2018 issue of Nature Communications, the study’s authors say those differences in multiple molecular features could in part explain disparities in breast cancer mortality for women from Nigeria, and perhaps other West African nations.
“In the era of precision medicine our data provide insights that could reduce the number of deaths from breast cancer across Sub-Saharan Africa and the developing world,” said study author Olufunmilayo Olopade, MD, the Walter L. Palmer Distinguished Service Professor of Medicine and Human Genetics, associate dean for Global Health and director of the Center for Clinical Cancer Genetics at the University of Chicago Medicine.