Recent Scientific Progress and Achievements:
Cancer Epidemiology
Accomplishments in this theme include the development and evaluation of resources to support epidemiological studies and the identification of environmental and genetic factors that influence breast cancer risk. These accomplishments include:
- A review of the impact of new information technology and the need for more rapidly available data on the quality of cancer care were highlighted (Hiatt 17; 639-46, 2006).
- A summary of national data on trends and disparities in socioeconomic and behavioral characteristics, life expectancy, and cause-specific mortality of native-born and foreign-born populations in the United States (Singh and Hiatt 35; 903-19, 2006).
- Assessment of associations between mammographic breast density and breast cancer risks showing that that BI-RADS breast density is a significant addition to prediction of breast cancer in pre-menopausal and postmenopausal women (Barlow et al. 98; 1204-14, 2006; Kerlikowske et al. 99; 386-95, 2007).
Future Plans: We will work with the Blood Sciences Research Institute (BSRI) to develop a genetics resource that will exploit the almost 1 million blood and serum samples in the BSRI frozen sample archive. Linking the genetic characteristics of these patients to breast cancer incidence will facilitate identification of breast cancer associated polymorphisms.
