[Sex, gender, and precision oncology : implications for general practitioners]

Sex and gender influence cancer risk, prognosis, and response to treatment. Sex modulates the incidence, efficacy, and toxicity of systemic therapies. Overall, most cancers are more frequent in men, except for thyroid cancer, which is more common in women. Women have better survival rates than men for several tumor sites, but they experience more toxicity from anticancer treatments. For targeted therapies, the unequal distribution of molecular alterations between sexes mainly affects the drug indications rather than their intrinsic efficacy. In immunotherapy, women seem to achieve a smaller relative benefit, possibly due to a more active immune system at baseline. These differences require general practitioners to adapt oncological follow-up, ensure early detection of toxicities, and provide sex-specific preventive counselling.