San Antonio: A new test to predict an average woman's odds of getting breast cancer works better than a method doctors have relied on for decades, researchers said.

The test is the first to combine dozens of genes and personal factors like age and childbearing to gauge risk in women who don t have a strong family history of the disease. They account for three-fourths of all cases.

In a California study to check its validity, the test correctly classified 50 per cent more women with breast cancer as high risk than the current method did, and properly scored others lower. Results were given at a cancer conference in Texas yesterday.

But cancer specialists said that even though this test and several others claiming to predict risk are available, more research is needed to prove their worth.

"The market is being flooded with all these tests making all these claims," said Len Lichtenfeld, deputy chief medical officer for the American Cancer Society.

"There's no Consumer Reports of genetic testing" to rate their accuracy and usefulness, he said.

Women and doctors have long wished for a simple test that could reveal risk beyond the two BRCA genes, which tend to cause cancer at early ages but account for only a few percent of all cases. In the last year, four companies started selling broader multi-gene tests, but their value is widely disputed.

Women thought to be at high risk can get more frequent mammograms or MRI scans to check for breast cancer, or consider hormone-blocking drugs like tamoxifen. But even some advocates for better prevention approaches don t think gene tests are a good idea until more is known about the best treatment options.

"Are we going to give everyone chemotherapy or chop off everyone's breasts?" asked Barbara Brenner, head of the advocacy group Breast Cancer Action.

Source : PTI