BRCA test negative!!

The genetic counselor just called with this very welcome news. It likely means I won't be looking at ovary removal, it's possible my chemo treatment will be shorter, and makes the mastectomy/lumpectomy choice less obvious. It's likely good news for my siblings, first cousins, and niece & nephew too.

We have asked for one additional genetic test as a follow-up, PALB2. This is a less common mutation that operates on the same pathway as BRCA -- if PALB2 has a mutation, BRCA can't do it's tumor suppressing job, and a recent study indicated it leads to similarly high risk of breast cancer (and, similar to BRCA, if I have it, it has implications for my family members... not sure about ovaries).