Recently in Breast Cancer Category

Women who had their tonsils removed in childhood may be at increased risk of developing pre-menopausal breast cancer, according to University at Buffalo researchers.

Study leader Theodore Brasky said an apparent association may be related to the loss of protective function of the tonsils when they are removed.

Alternatively, tonsils that needed to be removed may have been markers for severe or chronic infections in childhood, and that such infections cause inflammation that may contribute to cancer, Brasky said.

Abortion and miscarriage do not raise the risk of breast cancer, according to a study published Monday by the US National Cancer Institute in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

The 10-year study, performed on a sample of 105,716 US participants, rejects prior studies that suggested a link between prematurely terminated pregnancies and breast cancer.

The subjects were nurses aged 29-46 at the start of the study. They answered questions every two years via anonymous questionnaire about their medical history, including whether they had abortions, miscarriages and breast cancer.

"Among this predominantly pre-menopausal population, neither induced nor spontaneous abortion was associated with the incidence of breast cancer," said the study's authors from Brigham and Women's hospital and Harvard Medical School in the northeastern state of Massachusetts.

CUTTING-edge technology to improve breast cancer detection rates by 30 per cent will be rolled out across the state under a package announced yesterday.

The $26 million hi-tech breast screening process will boost cancer discovery rates by introducing digital intelligence to replace standard X-ray films.

The 21st-century system is particularly useful for picking up breast cancers in younger women, whose breast tissue is usually too dense to be filmed accurately by the old machines.

Breast cancer expert Dr Wendy Vincent said the new equipment would provide instant images for both patient and doctor and would be invaluable in regional NSW.

As a treatment for breast cancer, radiation, even modern regimens, appears to increase the risk of cardiovascular disease, according to a report in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute for March 7.

Earlier reports have indicated that radiotherapy regimens used in the 1970s elevate heart disease risk, but it has been less clear if more recent regimens also increase the risk.

Apart from the "clear benefits" of radiotherapy, doctors should still be aware of the potentially increased risk of cardiovascular disease following specific radiotherapy regimens in long-term breast cancer survivors, Dr. Flora E. van Leeuwen, from the Netherlands Cancer Institute in Amsterdam, and colleagues note in the report.

Breast cancer treatment trials supported by the pharmaceutical industry are more likely to report positive results than non-sponsored studies, according to a study to be published in the April 1, 2007 issue of CANCER, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Society. In addition, there are significant differences in the design of trials and types of questions addressed by pharmaceutical industry sponsored trials compared to non-sponsored trials. The study is the first to examine the impact of the pharmaceutical industry on breast cancer research.

Research and development (R&D) is critical to developing new therapies. The drug industry is a significant contributor to this effort, now with far greater spending than the United States' National Institutes of Health. As collaboration between the for-profit drug industry and academic medical centers has increased, so too have concerns over the potential impact of for-profit sponsorship on the nature and quality of the research and the potential for conflicts of interest. Several studies in other areas of medicine have suggested that pharmaceutical sponsorship leads to a greater chance that a clinical trial will yield positive results. The importance of this association for patients and researchers and the prevalence of this finding in cancer research are not yet clear.

Even among relatively young women with early-stage breast cancer, the side effects of therapy can vary by age, according to a new study.

Past research has found that for some premenopausal women, breast cancer treatment with standard chemotherapy or a hormonal therapy with goserelin is equally effective. This includes women with early-stage cancers that are positive for estrogen receptors; in these cancers tumor growth is fueled by estrogen.

Goserelin treats breast cancer by blocking the action of estrogen on tumor cells, while chemotherapy directly kills cancer cells, as well as some healthy cells in process.

Researchers in Spain conducted a Phase III clinical trial called GEICAM. They wanted to compare different chemotherapy regimes in women diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer. The trial included 252 women who had already been treated with anthracyclines and taxanes and experienced a recurrence.

One group of women was treated with Gemzar (gemcitabine) and Navelbine (vinorelbine), the other group was treated with Navelbine alone. The results were published in Lancet Oncology that states the combination of the two drugs improves progression free survival. It was also mentioned that this combination however did not improve overall survival.

Aggressive research currently underway brings hope of dramatic advances in breast cancer management, according to a new review. Published in the March 15, 2007 issue of CANCER, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Society, the review reveals that new approaches in breast cancer imaging, investigations into the timing of chemotherapy, and research on breast cancer vaccines may lead to exciting new nonsurgical tools for the physician treating breast cancer patients. These new tools may significantly alter current screening and treatment paradigms used by surgical oncologists, as well improving the care of patients.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Women who switch from the breast cancer pill tamoxifen to a newer class of drugs called aromatase inhibitors live longer, Italian researchers reported on Monday.

Their study, published in the journal Cancer, adds to a growing body of evidence that the new drugs are far safer, preventing cancer with fewer side effects than tamoxifen.

Dr. Lauren Cassell of Lenox Hill Hospital in New York said the research is changing how doctors treat breast cancer patients after their tumors are surgically removed.

"If they have been on tamoxifen we are switching them to an aromatase inhibitor. If they are newly diagnosed we are using an aromatase inhibitor instead of tamoxifen," she said in a statement.

Women with early stage breast cancer may soon get another gene test to help predict whether they'll relapse in five or 10 years, information that could influence how aggressively they fight the initial tumor.

The MammaPrint test isn't the nation's first such predictor for breast cancer — a competitor has sold here since 2004 — but on Tuesday it became the first to win formal approval from the Food and Drug Administration.

The test is far from perfect, warned FDA's Dr. Steven Gutman.

Indeed, the MammaPrint is much better at predicting who isn't likely to relapse than who is, Gutman said. He cited studies suggesting that when the MammaPrint predicts a woman is at high risk of cancer returning in five years, it will be right just a quarter of the time. That compares with 95 percent accuracy if the woman is told she's at low risk of a relapse.