The Science Changes
Here is another example of new data coming out that completely contradicts what we thought we knew.
The data concerns estrogen and breast cancer. It was presented at the 31st Annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium and it suggests that estrogen therapy may be beneficial to controlling metastatic breast cancer.
This new data found that for women that had “developed resistance to standard estrogen-lowering therapy… a daily dose of estrogen could stop the growth of their tumors or even cause them to shrink.” This is completely contrary to popular thought and current treatment in which patients are given drugs to minimize the hormone to avoid the growth of breast cancer in estrogen sensitive tumors.
In the study, participants were measured to see how well their aromatase inhibitor therapy-resistant metastatic breast cancer reacted to estrogen therapy and it was found that both the high- and low-dose treatments led to stabilization or shrinkage of metastatic tumors in about 30 percent of the participants.
Additionally, researchers found that “if study participants eventually experienced disease progression on estrogen, they could go back to an aromatase inhibitor that they were previously resistant to and see a benefit – their tumors were once again inhibited by estrogen deprivation.” When those effects ware off after several months, the researchers hypothesize that the tumors might again respond to estrogen therapy. “Some patients have cycled back and forth between estrogen and an aromatase inhibitor for several years, thereby managing their metastatic disease.” PET scanning was able to predict whose tumor would be responsive to estrogen therapy.
One of the researchers felt optimistic that estrogen therapy might be a preferable option to chemotherapy and may lead to a better quality of life.
Once again, the science as we know it is never static when it comes to medicine.
The data concerns estrogen and breast cancer. It was presented at the 31st Annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium and it suggests that estrogen therapy may be beneficial to controlling metastatic breast cancer.
This new data found that for women that had “developed resistance to standard estrogen-lowering therapy… a daily dose of estrogen could stop the growth of their tumors or even cause them to shrink.” This is completely contrary to popular thought and current treatment in which patients are given drugs to minimize the hormone to avoid the growth of breast cancer in estrogen sensitive tumors.
In the study, participants were measured to see how well their aromatase inhibitor therapy-resistant metastatic breast cancer reacted to estrogen therapy and it was found that both the high- and low-dose treatments led to stabilization or shrinkage of metastatic tumors in about 30 percent of the participants.
Additionally, researchers found that “if study participants eventually experienced disease progression on estrogen, they could go back to an aromatase inhibitor that they were previously resistant to and see a benefit – their tumors were once again inhibited by estrogen deprivation.” When those effects ware off after several months, the researchers hypothesize that the tumors might again respond to estrogen therapy. “Some patients have cycled back and forth between estrogen and an aromatase inhibitor for several years, thereby managing their metastatic disease.” PET scanning was able to predict whose tumor would be responsive to estrogen therapy.
One of the researchers felt optimistic that estrogen therapy might be a preferable option to chemotherapy and may lead to a better quality of life.
Once again, the science as we know it is never static when it comes to medicine.
Labels: breast cancer, study
posted by Anonymous at 6:01 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home