MED12 somatic mutations in breast fibroadenoma

Clinicians often face of challenge of distinguishing fibroadenomas from breast cancer. To facilitate this diagnostic question, scientists from the National Cancer Centre Singapore, Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School Singapore, and Singapore General Hospital embarked on a study to identify if there are any genetic abnormalities in fibroadenomas that may be used to differentiate them. The team showed that 59% of breast fibroadenomas contain somatic mutations in exon 2 of MED12. This mutation pattern is shared with another female-specific benign tumour, uterine leiomyoma. Read more here.