# Rachel Michaelson-Cohen

Source: https://onco.cc/people/rachel-michaelson-cohen/  
OnCo record `rachel-michaelson-cohen` (Person). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from OnCo (onco.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

Led the work of turning nine Israeli high-risk clinics, which were each doing something different, into one national protocol for looking after the carriers the screening programme keeps finding.

## Summary

Rachel Michaelson-Cohen works at Shaare Zedek Medical Center on hereditary breast and ovarian cancer. When Israel began offering BRCA founder testing to all women of Ashkenazi origin in 2020, the number of healthy carriers referred to high-risk surveillance clinics rose sharply and the clinics turned out to disagree with one another: only one offered six-monthly MRI to BRCA1 carriers, five continued surveillance past 75, and one recommended none during pregnancy and breastfeeding. She led the comparative analysis of all nine clinics in the Israeli Consortium for hereditary breast and ovarian cancer and the consensus process that produced a single national protocol, published in Israel Journal of Health Policy Research: annual MRI from 25, mammography added from 30, risk-reducing salpingo-oophorectomy at 35 to 40 for BRCA1 and 40 to 45 for BRCA2, pancreatic surveillance from 50 for BRCA2 carriers, and no ovarian screening after surgery. Her group also published the Israeli cost-effectiveness analysis behind the screening policy.

## Fields

- Kind: Person
- Last checked: 2026-09-25
- Tags: clinician-scientist; genetics; policy
- Role: Gynaecologist and medical geneticist, Shaare Zedek Medical Center; chair of the Israeli Consortium harmonising national BRCA carrier care
- Specialisms: Hereditary breast and ovarian cancer; Risk-reducing surgery; Health policy; Genetic counselling

## Sources

- Shaare Zedek Medical Center: https://www.szmc.org.il/eng/
- PubMed author search: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=Michaelson-Cohen%20R%5BAuthor%5D%20BRCA

## Connected records

- cancers: [HR-positive / HER2-negative breast cancer](https://onco.cc/cancers/breast-hr-positive/), [Ovarian cancer](https://onco.cc/cancers/ovarian/), [Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma](https://onco.cc/cancers/pancreatic/)
- fronts: [Prevention & Risk](https://onco.cc/fronts/prevention/)
- technologies: [Germline (hereditary) testing](https://onco.cc/technologies/germline-testing/)
- targets: [BRCA1 / BRCA2 (HRD)](https://onco.cc/targets/brca/)
- institutions: [Shaare Zedek Medical Center](https://onco.cc/institutions/shaare-zedek/)
- terms: [Founder variant](https://onco.cc/terms/founder-variant/)
- bottlenecks: [Inherited risk is mostly unidentified](https://onco.cc/bottlenecks/b-hereditary-risk/)

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