Objectives Oncogenetic counseling for hereditary breast cancer is an important tool for populational cancer risk screening. Individuals submitted to oncogenetic counseling must be aware about the social and emotional impact of genetic test result in their lives.

Methods Ten years follow-up of a cohort submitted to oncogenetic counseling in Brazil was evaluated for the health perception, depressive or anxious symptoms and life habits/behaviour before and after the oncogenetic counseling.Survival analyzes were performed using the Kaplan-Meier method and the Log-Rank test was used to verify the existence of significant differences.

Results 139 patients have been submitted to oncogenetic counselling, 135 women and 4 men; 113 patients had early onset breast cancer (81%), 33 patients harbor pathogenic germline mutation or VUS (33%), with the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes being the most frequently mutated (24% and 15%, respectively). Five years OS was 88% and no statistical difference in the OS was observed in both groups (without mutation 92% and with mutation 76%, p-value=0,138). Fifty-one patients reported having some degree of physical limitation to perform daily activities (41%), with complications of mastectomy being the main cause (62%). Eighteen patients harboring germline mutation stated that the diagnosis helped to change at least one habit of life, such as exercising or having a healthier diet (58%). Most patients had normal depressive scores (67% and 54%, respectively) and no correlation was found between these symptoms and oncological diagnosis (p=0,69 and p=0,75, respectively).

Conclusions In this population, oncogenetic counseling did not have a negative impact.