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People from different racial and ethnic backgrounds showed varied uptake of preventive mastectomy among those with genetic breast cancer risk. 

A study published in June 2025 issue of American Journal of Surgery, researchers compared the rates of risk-reducing mastectomies (RRM) among individuals with breast cancer (BC)–related pathogenic variants. 

They retrospectively analyzed data from a single academic center, identifying 528 female individuals aged ≥18 years with BC–related pathogenic variants and no current or prior BC diagnosis. The patients were categorized based on BRCA, high penetrance mutations (HPM), and moderate penetrance mutations (MPM) and classified race/ethnicity as non-Hispanic White (NHW), non-Hispanic Black (NHB), non-Hispanic other (NHO), and Hispanic. 

The results showed that out of 528 participants, 79.2% (n=418) were NHW, 7.0% (n=37) NHB, 3.6% (n=19) NHO, and 3.4% (n=18) Hispanic. A total of 16.5% underwent RRM, including 18.4% of NHW, 10.8% of NHB, and 5.6% of Hispanic individuals (P=0.45). No NHB patients with HPM [0/6] or MPM [0/11], and no Hispanic patients with HPM [0/5] or MPM [0/4], underwent RRM. 

Investigators concluded that race and ethnicity were associated with differing rates of RRM among individuals with BC–related pathogenic variants. 

Source: americanjournalofsurgery.com/article/S0002-9610(25)00308-3/abstract