Neither guideline eligibility nor Gleason scores are reliable for predicting prostate cancer risk due to pathogenic germline variants, according to a study published Feb. 7 in JAMA Oncology. The authors say that expanding genetic testing guidelines will improve medical management of prostate cancer patients and their families. “We propose that genetic testing guidelines should be simplified and expanded to include genetic testing of all men diagnosed with prostate cancer similar to guidelines for pancreatic and colorectal cancer,” say study coauthors led by Piper Nicolosi, Ph.D., from Invitae Corp. (San Francisco, Calif.), which also conducted the testing. “Simplification of testing guidelines would facilitate informed decision making for patients and their family members and provide the foundation for cascade testing of at-risk relatives before they develop cancer, initiating both surveillance and risk-reduction options.” Inherited risk for prostate cancer is associated with aggressive disease and poorer outcomes and has implications for staging, screening, guiding treatment, genetic counseling, and cascade testing of family members. However, genetic testing guidelines are complex and inconsistent between organizations. The present study evaluated the presence of pathologic variants in 3,607 men with a personal history of prostate cancer (mean age at diagnosis, 60 years) who underwent referral-based, germline testing […]