In less than a decade after the first human genome was sequenced at a cost of millions of dollars, experts believe that this type of medical advancement may become an affordable and incredibly useful tool for diagnostics.

Advances in technology in the last ten years now allow scientists to sequence entire genomes quickly and at a much lower cost that even a few years ago.

With this technology, checking for mutations that cause breast or ovarian cancer like BRCA1 and BRCA2 will let patients know they're at risk so they will be able to take proper action when the time comes instead of taking up lots of time figuring out a diagnosis from scratch.

Richard Wilson of Washington University's Genome Institute said, "Your physician, if armed with this information, is going to be much more aggressive in checking for breast cancer early, or ovarian cancer early".

In an interview with WebMD, Dr. Boris Pasche of the University of Alabama said that she expected that in a few years' time genome sequencing wouldn't be any more expensive than targeted sequencing, and that it would give doctors a much bigger picture of the status of the patient's health risks.

Hundreds of people have already had their genomes sequenced, and with this information, their doctors will be able to give them more sufficient diagnoses and treatments.