A new study has found that when parents get tested for breast cancer genes, many of them share their results with their children, even with those who are very young. Published in the journal Cancer, the study also revealed that most parents think that their children are not distressed when they learn about the test results.

For parents, one of the primary motivations for getting tested for hereditary cancer genes is to better understand the risk that their children face; however, many parents struggle with the decision of whether, and when, to tell their minor children the results of such tests. To help determine what factors make parents more or less likely to report their test results to their children, Angela Bradbury, MD, of the Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia, and her colleagues interviewed 253 parents who had genetic testing for mutations in two common breast cancer-related genes (BRCA1 and BRCA2) that can be inherited. All parents had children under the age of 25 at the time of the genetic test. The investigators asked parents whether they told their children their test results, and if they did, how they felt their children reacted to the information.