Breast Cancer

A new study found that smoking increases the risk of estrogen receptor (ER)-positive breast cancer for young women.

Scientists have discovered that the injection of an engineered virus into triple-negative breast cancer cells may allow the cancers to be treated with therapeutic radioiodine, a treatment traditionally used to treat thyroid cancers.

In this Circling Back feature, authors of the review article “Adjuvant Endocrine Therapy for Breast Cancer: How Long Is Long Enough?” discuss some of the especially interesting points made in the commentaries.

The introduction of survivorship care plans for cancer survivors may not be a cost-effective use of scarce health care resources, according to the results of a companion study of a randomized controlled trial.

A new study found that more than half of all patients experience pain 12 months after surgery and adjuvant therapy for breast cancer.

Updated recommendations issued by the USPSTF state that primary care physicians should screen women who have a family history of either breast, ovarian, tubal, or peritoneal cancers for BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutations.

Beneficial compounds in tomatoes may help lower the risk of breast cancer for postmenopausal women, according to a new study.

Final overall survival results of a trial comparing fulvestrant doses found that postmenopausal women with metastatic, ER–positive breast cancer had a 19% lower risk of death when taking a 500-mg dose compared with a 250-mg dose.

A study aimed at defining the natural history of breast implant-associated anaplastic large-cell lymphoma found that outcomes differ between those cases where the disease is confined within the fibrous capsule surrounding the implant and those where a mass is present in the breast.

The so-called “carryover” effect of tamoxifen results in the reduction in recurrence continuing well after treatment has stopped. The carryover effect is seen mostly in the first 5 years after treatment cessation, and recent evidence suggests that after that time, it is largely over.

In the future, we also need to improve our ability to personalize the duration of endocrine therapy, with a goal of optimizing patient selection for extended therapy. Hopefully, clinical-pathologic indices and predictive biomarkers similar to the Oncotype DX 12-gene recurrence score or the PAM50 risk of recurrence score for adjuvant chemotherapy will soon emerge to guide adjuvant endocrine therapy.

The strongest aspect of TCGA is that the data are publically available, fueling the input needed for unparalleled discovery. As the broader scientific community continues to analyze and integrate TCGA data with their own datasets, it is highly likely that breast cancer patients will benefit.

TCGA’s efforts to dissect the genomic complexity found in breast cancer patients represents only the beginning of a journey toward better understanding of the intricacy of the events that lead to this disease. Additional efforts are required to provide tailored and effective therapeutic interventions.

This article aims to provide an overview of The Cancer Genome Atlas findings, with a particular focus on their potential biological relevance and therapeutic implications.

New evidence now supports improved recurrence and breast cancer mortality outcomes with continued tamoxifen for up to 10 years in women of any age, and such long-duration therapy is especially important for women who remain premenopausal after their first 5 years of tamoxifen.

Can knowledge of a patient’s breast tumor genome help select the optimal treatment, and when we have an effective treatment for a group of patients-in this case, for breast cancer patients in the adjuvant setting-how long should the course of treatment be?

Women who developed a rash early in their treatment for HER2-positive breast cancer with lapatinib were more likely to go on to have pathologic complete response compared to those who did not get a rash, according to the results of an unplanned analysis of data from the NeoALTTO trial.

Concurrent administration of trastuzumab and anthracyclines resulted in a similar rate of pathologic complete response when compared to sequential administration in women with HER2-positive breast cancer, according to the results of a new study.

Two studies indicate that older women with trastuzumab-treated breast cancer and those who undergo radiation to the left chest wall may be at risk for increased rates of cardiotoxicity.

Researchers have found that the breast cancer drug exemestane may also protect cells against DNA damage from UV radiation as well as damage that occurs during inflammation and oxidative stress.

Two independent research groups have identified resistance mutations in the gene that encodes the estrogen receptor in some cases of metastatic breast cancer.

Increased doses of aerobic exercises lasting 50 to 60 minutes were found to be more effective than a standard dose of 30 minutes for managing declines in physical functioning and symptoms such as pain, hot flashes, and fatigue in women undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer.

Patients with early-stage breast cancer who received radiation therapy had a higher risk of heart disease, due to the exposure of their heart tissue to the treatment, according to a 48-patient study by Columbia University.

A recent prospective trial showed sentinel lymph node surgery has a clinically significant high false negative rate in breast cancer patients with node-positive disease receiving neoadjuvant chemotherapy. In this interview we discuss surgical techniques that detect breast cancer in lymph nodes.

New ASCO and CAP guidelines recommend HER2 testing for all newly diagnosed breast cancer patients with either early-stage invasive or metastatic disease.