Ethical Issues in Genetic Testing for Inherited Cancer Predisposition Syndromes: the Potentially Conflicting Interests of Patients and Their Relatives

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Kenny, J; Burcher, S; Kohut, K; Eastman, N (2020) Ethical Issues in Genetic Testing for Inherited Cancer Predisposition Syndromes: the Potentially Conflicting Interests of Patients and Their Relatives. CURRENT GENETIC MEDICINE REPORTS, 8 (2). pp. 72-77. ISSN 2167-4876 https://doi.org/10.1007/s40142-020-00186-8
SGUL Authors: Eastman, Nigel Lyons Gwynne

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Abstract

Purpose of Review This review uses clinical cases to highlight some of the ethical dilemmas currently faced by oncologists, geneticists and others who request genetic testing for inherited cancer disorders. Recent Findings Recent ethical guidance supports clinicians in testing patients when other family members decline similar testing, even when such testing will reveal those family members’ genetic status. And increasingly there is acknowledgement that when a patient declines to share genetic results with family members, clinicians may have an ethical duty to breach patient confidentiality in order to inform at-risk relatives to whom they may owe a duty of care, so that they can choose to access genetic testing and potentially life-saving screening and treatment. Summary Genetic testing for inherited cancer disorders raises multiple ethical issues, which cannot always be easily resolved by discussion with patients, or with their family members. Clinical ethics committees can provide valuable assistance in resolving the dilemmas presented in these cases.

Item Type:

Article

Additional Information:

© The Author(s) 2020 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

Keywords:

Cancer, Predictive genetic testing, Confidentiality, Duty of care, Ethics

SGUL Research Institute / Research Centre:

Academic Structure > Institute of Medical & Biomedical Education (IMBE)

Journal or Publication Title:

CURRENT GENETIC MEDICINE REPORTS

ISSN:

2167-4876

Dates: