MLH1 and cancer: This arose because male carriers of MLH1 gene mutations had a significantly higher risk of cancer than female carriers at all ages (67% vs. 35% by age 70, p-value = 0.02) (Table 3 and Figure 1), while male and female carriers of MSH2 mutations had similar cumulative risks of disease (≈ 54%, p-value = 0.89) (Table 3).