Data from a study involving thousands of identical twins casts reveals that whole genome sequencing will not provide solid predictive information for most people about their risk for many common diseases, including cancers.

The findings, from a research team at Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center, are published in Science Translational Medicine, in advance of the “AACR–Irving Weinstein Foundation Distinguished Scholarship.”

The data will be presented by Bert Vogelstein, M.D., at the AACR Annual Meeting 2012.

He will be joined by the following expert discussants: Thomas Sellers, Ph.D., M.P.H., executive vice president and MRI director at the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center & Research Institute in Tampa, Fla.; Timothy Rebbeck, Ph.D., professor of epidemiology at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine in Philadelphia, Pa., and editor-in-chief of Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research; and Olufunmilayo I. Olopade, M.D., F.A.C.P., professor of medicine and human genetics and director of the Cancer Risk Clinic at the University of Chicago School of Medicine in Chicago, Ill.

The research team at Hopkins collected information on the incidence of 24 diseases among the twin-pair groups, including cancer, as well as autoimmune, cardiovascular, genitourinary, neurological and obesity-associated diseases.

Analyses conducted using mathematical models showed that whole genome sequencing could alert most individuals to an increased risk for at least one disease, signaled by a positive test result. However, most people would receive negative test results for the majority of diseases studied, failing to forewarn them of the diseases they may ultimately develop.

“We believe that genomic tests will not be substitutes for current disease prevention strategies,” said Vogelstein. “Prudent screening, early diagnosis and prevention strategies, such as not smoking and removing early cancers, will be the keys to cutting disease death rates.”

The study was funded by the Lustgarten Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer Research, the Virginia and D.K. Ludwig Fund for Cancer Research, National Institutes of Health, an AACR–Stand Up To Cancer Dream Team Translational Research Grant, the Dr. Miriam and Sheldon G. Adelson Medical Research Foundation and the European Community’s Seventh Framework Program.

Source: AACR