Prostate cancer in the family increases risk of breast cancer. Most people know that having breast cancer or ovarian cancer in the family can up your own breast cancer risk. But new research has found that prostate cancer in close relatives also matters. “The researchers used data for more than 78,000 women in the Women’s Health Initiative who were over age 50 and cancer-free when the study began in 1993. By 2009 there had been 3,506 new breast cancers in the original group. Twenty percent of women with breast cancer had first-degree relatives with the disease, compared with nearly 15 percent of those who did not develop breast cancer. There was a similar, but very slight, association with prostate cancer. More than 11 percent of women who developed breast cancer reported a first-degree relative with prostate cancer, compared to about 10 percent of women without the disease. Having a father, brother or son with prostate cancer increased the risk of breast cancer by about 14 percent.” The research supports similar findings in the past, but now on a larger scale. The data provides individuals and physicians with more information about who might be at highest risk and need closer surveillance for developing cancer. 

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