Health committee  I think it's about trying to identify which provinces seem to be falling behind and trying to engage the population, because it could also be due to a lack of family physicians and to disparities in being able to provide the primary education, even in the clinics, as children are growing up and going to see their pediatricians or their family physicians.

Health committee  It's not genetically related.

Health committee  Do you mean for cervix cancer itself?

Health committee  For the reproductive organs, ovarian cancer is the strongest. It's related to the BRCA mutations we also see in breast cancer. This is where we have an opportunity to intercede for a lot of women. If we know they have family members who have a BRCA mutation, they can go ahead and get themselves tested.

Health committee  Typically, for ovarian cancer, we're usually asking women who have that cancer history with family members to go ahead and remove Fallopian tubes and ovaries at a minimum of about 10 years before an incidental cancer in their family or as soon as they are done child-bearing. The reason we say this is that ovarian cancer is so difficult to treat.

Health committee  Thank you. Good afternoon, Mr. Chair, committee members and fellow witnesses. I'm very honoured to be here before you to present before this committee. I'm a practising gynecologic oncologist at the Jewish General Hospital in Montreal, and I am also the president-elect of the Society of Gynecologic Oncology of Canada, also called GOC.