Hospital de Amor in Barretos, São Paulo state, has created a database combining genetic, epidemiological and lifestyle information to predict cancer risk in the Brazilian population. It already includes 4,062 participants and almost 40,000 blood samples, and the goal is to reach at least 8,000 people in the next two years.
The first cancers studied are breast, colorectal and cervical. The main tool being developed is a polygenic risk score, which estimates inherited predisposition by combining the effect of many small genetic variants.
Coordinator Rui Manuel Reis points out that more than 90% of participants in large genomic studies have European ancestry, so these tools must be validated in the Brazilian population. The biorepository was described in the journal iScience and is not yet ready for use in the public health system.
