Hereditary prostate cancer

Abstract

Prostate cancer (PC) is one of the most common cancers affecting men. It may soon become the main cancer--caused mortality among men all over the world. The genetic basis of prostate cancer is very complex and its etiology is poorly understood. The genes associated with hereditary predisposition to prostate cancer remain largely unknown. Family history of PC, particularly at a young age, is a strong risk factor. Through linkage analysis, numerous prostate cancer susceptibility chromosomal loci have been identified, including: HPC1 (1q24-25), PCaP (1q42.2-43), HPCX (Xq27-28), CAPB (1p36), HPC2 (17p12), HPC20 (20q13). However, it turned out that any of these genes is not a high-risk prostate cancer susceptibility gene. According to literature data HPC is associated with genes involved in androgen metabolism, including androgen receptor gene--AR, SRD5A2 and CYP17, genes involved in the DNA damage repair, including BRCA1, BRCA2, NBS1 and MLH1 or some developmental genes as HOXB13. Identification of PC high predisposition susceptibility genes is very important, because the ascertainment of a higher risk of prostate cancer development in mutation carriers enable to develop and implement in clinical practice suitable prophylactic programs which could prevent the disease or detect it in an early stage. It seems that better knowledge of the molecular pathology of prostate cancer could make it easier to discover new drugs of chemopreventive and chemotherapeutic activity. There are many cellular pathways associated with PC cancerogenesis, which may become a potential goal for such drugs in the future.