ArticleFamily medicine and community health2025
Acceptance and attitudes towards genetic cancer testing among German general practice patients: a cross-sectional survey.
Article in Family medicine and community health, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 2 papers.
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Who cites it
2 citing papers in PubMed.
- Awareness, Attitudes, and Expectations of Indian Cancer Patients and Their Caregivers on Hereditary Cancers and Genetic Testing at a Tertiary Cancer Centre in India.Journal of genetic counseling · 2026Article
- Knowledge, attitudes and practices of cancer genetics in family medicine in Japan: a mixed methods study.BMC primary care · 2026Article
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveThis study describes acceptance and attitudes towards genetic cancer testing among German primary care patients.
designCross-sectional survey.
settingPrimary care. PARTICIPANT: Systematically recruited patients aged ≥18 years from six general practices in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania participated in an anonymous self-administered survey on familial cancer prevention (n=479 and 67.0% participation rate). Those with complete data were analysed (n=424; mean age 53.7, SD 16.6 years; men 34.4%). Linear regression analyses were used to examine potential disparities in general acceptance of genetic testing and attitudes towards genetic cancer testing according to sociodemographics and familial cancer knowledge.
resultGeneral acceptance of genetic testing was high, particularly among younger, higher-educated individuals and those with a family history of cancer and higher familial cancer knowledge. For example, 83.3% either agreed or strongly agreed that it should be available to anybody. The most important benefits of genetic cancer testing were to guide check-up frequency (81.4%), to inform medical decision-making (80.2%) and to understand children's risk (75.2%). The most important concerns included the potential burden on the family (44.6%) and the belief that cancer cannot be prevented (39.2%). More favourable attitudes were found among younger, higher-educated individuals, those with a personal history of cancer and those with fewer children or no partner. For example, higher age was linked to lower benefit (regression coefficient (RC) -0.01, 95% CI -0.01 to -0.001) and higher concern ratings (RC 0.01, 95% CI 0.002 to 0.01). About a third (34.7%) rated not wanting to know about genetic alterations that increase their cancer risk as a (very) important reason against testing. Information avoidance was higher among older individuals (RC 0.02, 95% CI 0.01 to 0.02), women (RC 0.40, 95% CI 0.11 to 0.69), those with lower education (RC -0.64, 95% CI -0.91 to -0.36) and those with more children (RC 0.21, 95% CI 0.09 to 0.33).
conclusionAcceptance of genetic testing was high, but barriers remain, particularly among older adults, women, the less educated and those with more children. Targeted educational efforts to improve health literacy, emphasise the preventive potential of genetic testing and emotional support through genetic counselling are essential to overcome these barriers and promote informed decision-making.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.