The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is sharing in a $19.3 million National Cancer Institute grant to study why young, African-American women are at greater risk for breast cancer.
UNC researchers are teaming with researchers at Boston University and Roswell Park Cancer Institute in the five-year study of the health disparity. With data from more than 10,000 women, researchers say the study will be the largest of its type.
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UNC’s ongoing Carolina Breast Cancer Study has shown that African-American women under age 45 are more likely to be diagnosed with aggressive breast cancer compared to women of European descent. The study has also demonstrated that breast cancer has at least five subtypes.
The NCI grant will fund a five-year research project that will study the risk factors and genes that could be associated with the different breast cancer subtypes. The study will include data from 5,500 African-American women from the Carolina Breast Cancer Study and three other ongoing studies. The study will also include data from controls — 5,500 healthy women. Researchers say that until now, such studies have been hampered by not having a large enough population to study.
Robert Millikan, professor of epidemiology in UNC’s Gillings School of Global Public Health and a member of UNC’s Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, will be partnering with Christine Ambrose of the Roswell Park Cancer Institute and Julie Palmer of the Slone Epidemiology Center at Boston University.
The study will look at a number of factors that could contribute to the breast cancer disparity, including genetics, reproductive history, lactation and hormones, in an effort to improve breast cancer treatment and reduce the cancer risks for young, African-American women.
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“Our aim is to explore the potential biologic, environmental and epidemiologic causes of this difference in cancer incidence,” Millikan said in a statement. “Our previous studies and those of our colleagues have suggested hypotheses that we will be investigating with this larger group of patients.”