ABSTRACT
Ovarian cancer is the ninth most common cancer among women in the United States, but is the leading cause of gynecologic cancer-related death. Approximately 1 woman in every 72 women in the United States will be diagnosed with ovarian cancer during her lifetime, and a woman’s risk of death from ovarian cancer is 1 in 95 (Howlader et al., 2012). In 2012, 22,280 U.S. women were diagnosed with ovarian cancer and 15,500 died from this disease (Siegel et al., 2012). The prognosis of advanced ovarian cancer is poor; however, 5-year survival rates from early-stage disease are greater than 90%. The majority of women diagnosed with ovarian cancer (more than 75%) have advanced stage disease (stage III-IV), which has less than 30% 5-year survival rate (Howlader et al., 2012).
