Added: 06/23/2007 |
The Assurance Provided by Adjuvant Hormonal TherapyWomen with breast cancer do not always need to undergo the traditional chemotherapy. Some women benefit from adjuvant hormonal therapy. They are given a medicine that blocks a metabolic pathway, a vital pathway for the growing breast cancer cells. Other women can be treated with a monoclonal antibody. Their treatment magnifies the value of ongoing molecular biology research.
Sometimes a physician recommends the inclusion of both radiation therapy and adjuvant hormonal therapy in a post-operative treatment. Sometimes a physician feels that a female breast cancer patient can avoid recurrence of her cancer by using only the hormonal therapy. No single one of the various post-operative therapies can guarantee eradication of all of the varied types of breast cancer.
Not every breast tumor has the same sort of biochemistry. The cells of some breast tumors make a protein called Her-2. When a tumor produces Her-2 protein, then the cells in that tumor can be attacked by the drug Herceptin. A monoclonal antibody, Herceptin acts like a “magic bullet.” It carries a chosen cancer treatment to the malignant cells, the cells that the doctors want to kill.
Yet not every woman has cells that respond to Herceptin. Women who have a breast tumor with estrogen-dependent cells can benefit from an alternate treatment--adjuvant hormonal therapy. The pharmaceutical industry continues to add to the number of medicines that can block the production of estrogen. It works constantly to refine and improve the existing aromatase inhibitors.
Both Tamoxifen and Arimidex are aromatase inhibitors. Both medications provide doctors with the means to deliver adjuvant hormonal therapy. Both medicines interfere with the conversion of an androgen into estrogen. They hamper the ability of aromatase to catalyze that conversion. When the cells in the tumor fail to produce estrogen, the tumor cells fail to thrive, and thus they die.
As the pool of available aromatase inhibitors expanded, doctors tired of using the long phrase “adjuvant hormonal therapy.” Eventually they chose to group all aromatase inhibitors under one very descriptive name. Some doctors talked to their female breast cancer patients about the benefits of an “anti-estrogen” medicine.
Studies have shown that the “anti-estrogen” medicines can do more than just kill cancer cells. Study statistics have pointed to the ability of adjuvant hormonal therapy to limit the recurrence of breast cancer. A woman given an “anti-estrogen,” has a reduced chance for getting sobering news, i.e. news of the return of her breast cancer.
Moreover, a woman who has received an “anti-estrogen” following surgery for breast cancer is less likely to develop a breast tumor in her second breast. The hormonal therapy reduces the ability of the cancer cells to spread from one breast to an adjoining breast.
Women who are genetically predisposed to breast cancer can use an “anti-estrogen” to reduce their risk for getting that dreaded female cancer.
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