Dr Ian Walker, Cancer Research UK’s director of clinical research, said: “Finding the most appropriate way to give treatments like radiotherapy is a crucial part of treating cancer”. The study has examined the effectiveness of courses of hormonal drugs prescribed over a prolonged period of time. The “future of cancer treatment” is likely to involve tumour testing which can determine whether gruelling treatments would offer any benefits.
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Bosserman said the researchers found potentially long-term disease control for some patients. The trial was carried out on post-menopausal women.
Previous study has proved the efficacy of extending the tamoxifen treatment for 10 years.
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“At the end of the study, 95% of women were still cancer-free if they had taken the extra medication, compared with 91% without”. Side effects of the treatment included loss of libido, hot flushes and vaginal dryness. Women on AIs are also at higher risk of bone fractures.
He said the new research “provides direction for many patients and their doctors, confirming that prolonging aromatase inhibitor therapy can further reduce the risk of breast cancer recurrences”. Turner said that extended letrozole in 10 to 15 years has benefit in preventing a new breast cancer diagnosis.
Research on more than 300 women with early-stage breast cancer reinforces earlier work which suggests diet may play an important role in cutting cancer risk.
Based on the preclinical data that has demonstrated that the combination of an anti-estrogen with a HER2 inhibitor results in enhanced anti-tumor activity in preclinical models of estrogen receptor positive/HER2-mutated breast tumors, the study has been amended to administer the combination of neratinib plus fulvestrant in eligible hormone receptor positive breast cancer patients who have an activating HER2 mutation in the tumor.
The collected data has been dispersed widely among researchers, with discoveries regularly shared with study participants. All had taken letrozole for about 5 years; some also had been treated previously with tamoxifen.
The study enrolled 1,918 postmenopausal women for the randomized Phase 3 trial; half received letrozole and half got a placebo.
“The new trial adds further evidence to support the view that women with hormone sensitive breast cancer should continue to take hormone blocking drugs for at least 10 years, or as long as is feasible”. Of those, 67 were in the letrozole group while 98 were in the placebo group.
Clinical trial results show the combination of abdominal and IV chemotherapy can slow the progression of ovarian cancer better than IV chemo by itself in women who already have had surgery to remove all or almost all of their cancer.
Experts described it as a “big deal” that will change treatment for millions of women. “But they warned there were risks, including osteoporosis”. Also, although this study was carried out in the United Kingdom, cardiologists in the USA and elsewhere have also voiced concern for heart monitoring in patients treated for breast cancer.
A novel antibody that targets claudin 18.2 is helping some patients with advanced gastric cancer live longer, according to a study presented at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), held from June 3 to 7 in Chicago.
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“There isn’t a point at which we look at the woman and say ‘You’re done, it’s not going to come back, ‘ ” said Dr. Lisa Carey, a breast cancer specialist at the University of North Carolina who was not involved in the study.
