We found that HOXA11 was hypermethylated in cancer tissues (45.08%), especially in invasive ductal carcinomas (P<0.001), patients with a family history of cancer (P=0.033), cases with metastatic lymph nodes (P=0.004) and P53 positive group (P=0.017). The gene discussed is HOXA11; the disease is invasive ductal breast carcinoma.