TP53-associated early breast cancer: new observations from a large cohort.

BACKGROUND: A large well-annotated recent international cohort of Li-Fraumeni (LFS) patients with early-stage breast cancer (BC) was examined for shared features. METHODS: This multicentre cohort study included females with a germline TP53 pathogenic or likely pathogenic variant and nonmetastatic BC diagnosed between 2002-2022. Clinical and genetic data were obtained from institutional registries and clinical charts. Descriptive statistics were utilized to summarize proportions and differences were assessed by Chi square or Wilcoxon rank sum tests. Metachronous contralateral breast cancer (CBC) risk, radiation-induced sarcoma risk, and recurrence-free survival (RFS) were analyzed by Kaplan-Meier methodology. RESULTS: Among 227 females who met study criteria, the median age of first BC diagnosis was 37 years (range 21-71), 11.9% presented with bilateral synchronous BC and 18.1% had ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) only. In total, 166 (73.1%) underwent mastectomies including 67 bilateral mastectomies as first BC surgery. Among those with retained breast tissue, CBC rate was 25.3% at 5-years. Among 186 invasive tumors, 72.1% were stages I-II, 48.9% node-negative, and the most common subtypes were HR+/HER2- (40.9%) and HR+/HER2 + (34.4%). At a median follow-up of 69.9 months (IQR 32.6-125.9), invasive HR+/HER2- disease had the highest recurrence risk among the subtypes (5-year RFS 61.1%, p = .0012). Among those who received radiation therapy (n = 79), the 5-year radiation-induced sarcoma rate was 4.8%. CONCLUSION: We observed high rates of DCIS, HR+ and HER2+ breast cancers, with a worse outcome in the HR+/HER2- luminal tumors despite appropriate treatment. Confirmation of these findings in further studies could have implications for BC care in LFS.

No Association of Early-Onset Breast or Ovarian Cancer with Early-Onset Cancer in Relatives in BRCA1 or BRCA2 Mutation Families.

According to clinical guidelines, the occurrence of very early-onset breast cancer (VEO-BC) (diagnosed ≤ age 30 years) or VEO ovarian cancer (VEO-OC) (diagnosed ≤ age 40 years) in families with BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutation (BRCAm) prompts advancing the age of risk-reducing strategies in relatives. This study aimed to assess the relation between the occurrence of VEO-BC or VEO-OC in families with BRCAm and age at BC or OC diagnosis in relatives. We conducted a retrospective multicenter study of 448 consecutive families with BRCAm from 2003 to 2018. Mean age and 5-year-span distribution of age at BC or OC in relatives were compared in families with or without VEO-BC or VEO-OC. Conditional probability calculation and Cochran-Mantel-Haenszel chi-square tests were used to investigate early-onset cancer occurrence in relatives of VEO-BC and VEO-OC cases. Overall, 15% (19/245) of families with BRCA1m and 9% (19/203) with BRCA2m featured at least one case of VEO-BC; 8% (37/245) and 2% (2/203) featured at least one case of VEO-OC, respectively. The cumulative prevalence of VEO-BC was 5.1% (95% CI 3.6-6.6) and 2.5% (95% CI 1.4-3.6) for families with BRCA1m and BRCA2m, respectively. The distribution of age and mean age at BC diagnosis in relatives did not differ by occurrence of VEO-BC for families with BRCA1m or BRCA2m. Conditional probability calculations did not show an increase of early-onset BC in VEO-BC families with BRCA1m or BRCA2m. Conversely, the probability of VEO-BC was not increased in families with early-onset BC. VEO-BC or VEO-OC occurrence may not be related to young age at BC or OC onset in relatives in families with BRCAm. This finding-together with a relatively high VEO-BC risk for women with BRCAm-advocates for MRI breast screening from age 25 regardless of family history.

Clinical practice guidelines for BRCA1 and BRCA2 genetic testing.

BRCA1 and BRCA2 gene pathogenic variants account for most hereditary breast cancer and are increasingly used to determine eligibility for PARP inhibitor (PARPi) therapy of BRCA-related cancer. Because issues of BRCA testing in clinical practice now overlap with both preventive and therapeutic management, updated and comprehensive practice guidelines for BRCA genotyping are needed. The integrative recommendations for BRCA testing presented here aim to (1) identify individuals who may benefit from genetic counselling and risk-reducing strategies; (2) update germline and tumour-testing indications for PARPi-approved therapies; (3) provide testing recommendations for personalised management of early and metastatic breast cancer; and (4) address the issues of rapid process and tumour analysis. An international group of experts, including geneticists, medical and surgical oncologists, pathologists, ethicists and patient representatives, was commissioned by the French Society of Predictive and Personalised Medicine (SFMPP). The group followed a methodology based on specific formal guidelines development, including (1) evaluating the likelihood of BRCAm from a combined systematic review of the literature, risk assessment models and expert quotations, and (2) therapeutic values of BRCAm status for PARPi therapy in BRCA-related cancer and for management of early and advanced breast cancer. These international guidelines may help clinicians comprehensively update and standardise BRCA testing practices.

Single Circulating Fetal Trophoblastic Cells Eligible for Non Invasive Prenatal Diagnosis: the Exception Rather than the Rule.

Non-Invasive Prenatal Diagnosis (NIPD), based on the analysis of circulating cell-free fetal DNA (cff-DNA), is successfully implemented for an increasing number of monogenic diseases. However, technical issues related to cff-DNA characteristics remain, and not all mutations can be screened with this method, particularly triplet expansion mutations that frequently concern prenatal diagnosis requests. The objective of this study was to develop an approach to isolate and analyze Circulating Trophoblastic Fetal Cells (CFTCs) for NIPD of monogenic diseases caused by triplet repeat expansion or point mutations. We developed a method for CFTC isolation based on DEPArray sorting and used Huntington's disease as the clinical model for CFTC-based NIPD. Then, we investigated whether CFTC isolation and Whole Genome Amplification (WGA) could be used for NIPD in couples at risk of transmitting different monogenic diseases. Our data show that the allele drop-out rate was 3-fold higher in CFTCs than in maternal cells processed in the same way. Moreover, we give new insights into CFTCs by compiling data obtained by extensive molecular testing by microsatellite multiplex PCR genotyping and by WGA followed by mini-exome sequencing. CFTCs appear to be often characterized by a random state of genomic degradation.

Correction: The genomic and clinical landscape of fetal akinesia.

An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via a link at the top of the paper.

The genomic and clinical landscape of fetal akinesia.

PURPOSE: Fetal akinesia has multiple clinical subtypes with over 160 gene associations, but the genetic etiology is not yet completely understood. METHODS: In this study, 51 patients from 47 unrelated families were analyzed using next-generation sequencing (NGS) techniques aiming to decipher the genomic landscape of fetal akinesia (FA). RESULTS: We have identified likely pathogenic gene variants in 37 cases and report 41 novel variants. Additionally, we report putative pathogenic variants in eight cases including nine novel variants. Our work identified 14 novel disease-gene associations for fetal akinesia: ADSSL1, ASAH1, ASPM, ATP2B3, EARS2, FBLN1, PRG4, PRICKLE1, ROR2, SETBP1, SCN5A, SCN8A, and ZEB2. Furthermore, a sibling pair harbored a homozygous copy-number variant in TNNT1, an ultrarare congenital myopathy gene that has been linked to arthrogryposis via Gene Ontology analysis. CONCLUSION: Our analysis indicates that genetic defects leading to primary skeletal muscle diseases might have been underdiagnosed, especially pathogenic variants in RYR1. We discuss three novel putative fetal akinesia genes: GCN1, IQSEC3 and RYR3. Of those, IQSEC3, and RYR3 had been proposed as neuromuscular disease-associated genes recently, and our findings endorse them as FA candidate genes. By combining NGS with deep clinical phenotyping, we achieved a 73% success rate of solved cases.

Osteosarcoma without prior retinoblastoma related to RB1 low-penetrance germline pathogenic variants: A novel type of RB1-related hereditary predisposition syndrome?

BACKGROUND: Retinoblastoma (Rb) is a rare intraocular malignant tumor in children with high overall survival. Predisposition to Rb is linked to RB1 germline mutations with high penetrance, but rare RB1 low-penetrance variants are also known. Rb survivors are at risk of second primary malignancies (SPMs), mostly osteosarcoma and soft-tissue sarcoma. Nevertheless, the risk of primary osteosarcoma developing without prior Rb has not been reported in RB1 germline mutation carriers. METHODS: We report a patient in whom osteosarcoma developed at age 17 as a first primary malignancy within a family context of sarcoma. RESULTS: Unexpectedly, genetic testing identified a low-penetrance germline mutation in RB1 [NM_000321.2: c.45_76dup; p.(Pro26Leufs*50)]. In eight additional similar cases from published and unpublished reports of families, first primary osteosarcomas and sarcomas mostly developed in RB1 low-penetrance mutation carriers without prior Rb. CONCLUSION: We propose that first primary sarcoma and osteosarcoma could be a novel clinical presentation of a RB1-related hereditary predisposition syndrome linked to RB1 low-penetrance germline mutations. In these families, careful screening of primary non-Rb cancer and SPMs is required by maintaining enhanced clinical vigilance. Implementing lifelong periodic whole-body MRI screening might be a complementary strategy for unaffected carrier relatives in these families.

Report on three additional patients and genotype-phenotype correlation in SLC25A22-related disorders group.

Early infantile epileptic encephalopathy (EIEE) is a heterogeneous group of severe forms of age-related developmental and epileptic encephalopathies with onset during the first weeks or months of life. The interictal electroencephalogram (EEG) shows a "suppression burst" (SB) pattern. The prognosis is usually poor and most children die within the first two years or survive with very severe intellectual disabilities. EIEE type 3 is caused by variants affecting function, in SLC25A22, which is also responsible for epilepsy of infancy with migrating focal seizures (EIMFS). We report a family with a less severe phenotype of EIEE type 3. We performed exome sequencing and identified two unreported variants in SLC25A22 in the compound heterozygous state: NM_024698.4: c.[813_814delTG];[818 G>A] (p.[Ala272Glnfs*144];[Arg273Lys]). Functional studies in cultured skin fibroblasts from a patient showed that glutamate oxidation was strongly defective, based on a literature review. We clustered the 18 published patients (including those from this family) into three groups according to the severity of the SLC25A22-related disorders. In an attempt to identify genotype-phenotype correlations, we compared the variants according to the location depending on the protein domains. We observed that patients with two variants located in helical transmembrane domains presented a severe phenotype, whereas patients with at least one variant outside helical transmembrane domains presented a milder phenotype. These data are suggestive of a continuum of disorders related to SLC25A22 that could be called SLC25A22-related disorders. This might be a first clue to enable geneticists to outline a prognosis based on genetic molecular data regarding the SLC25A22 gene.

Ovarian Clear Cell Carcinoma in Cowden Syndrome.

Cowden syndrome (CS) is an autosomal dominant mendelian disease related to germline pathogenic variants affecting the PTEN-gene. CS is characterized by macrocephaly, mucocutaneous lesions, and an increased risk of breast and thyroid cancers. Rare ovarian cancer cases (mostly embryonic tumors) associated with PTEN have been described in the literature, but no current CS guidelines are available for ovarian cancer risk management. We report on a woman diagnosed with ovarian clear cell carcinoma (OCCC) at 28 years of age. The patient displayed macrocephaly, trichilemmomas, oral papillomatosis, and acral keratosis. A family history of multiple cancer cases within the PTEN-related tumor spectrum was identified. In addition, PET scan and fine-needle biopsy results led to a diagnosis of thyroid follicular neoplasia. PTEN sequencing revealed that she carried a germline inherited pathogenic variant in exon 5 c.388C>T, p.(Arg130*) (NM_000314). Somatic mismatch repair immunohistochemistry analysis showed normal expression, and germline BRCA1/2 sequencing did not reveal pathogenic or likely pathogenic variants. An ovarian cell immunohistochemistry analysis reported total loss of PTEN expression, which strongly suggested the role of PTEN in the oncogenesis of this cancer. Hence, a total thyroid resection was performed instead of thyroid lobectomy and a risk-reducing bilateral mastectomy was discussed. Co-occurrence of this pathogenic germline mutation in PTEN in this patient, early development of OCCC at age 28 years, and total loss of PTEN expression in the tumor might support the involvement of PTEN in the carcinogenesis of her ovarian cancer. We describe a new ovarian cancer case with an atypical histologic type-clear cell carcinoma-in CS. This observation might be the first indication of the need to expand the PTEN-related tumor spectrum to incorporate OCCC. The CS diagnosis significantly changed the therapeutic outcome of this patient.

LARP7 variants and further delineation of the Alazami syndrome phenotypic spectrum among primordial dwarfisms: 2 sisters.

Alazami syndrome (AS) (MIM# 615071) is an autosomal recessive microcephalic primordial dwarfism (PD) with recognizable facial features and severe intellectual disability due to depletion or loss of function variants in LARP7. To date, 15 patients with AS have been reported. Here we describe two consanguineous Algerian sisters with Alazami PD due to LARP7 homozygous pathogenic variants detected by whole exome sequencing. By comparing these two additional cases with those previously reported, we strengthen the key features of AS: severe growth restriction, severe intellectual disability and some distinguishing facial features such as broad nose, malar hypoplasia, wide mouth, full lips and abnormally set teeth. We also report significant new findings enabling further delineation of this syndrome: disproportionately mild microcephaly, stereotypic hand wringing and severe anxiety, thickened skin over the hands and feet, and skeletal, eye and heart malformations. From previous reviews, we summarize the main etiologies of PD according to the involved mechanisms and cellular pathways, highlighting their clinical core features.