Several clinical studies have shown that the treatment, which includes a series of medicine designed and developed based on hormones, is equally if not more efficient and has less side-effects than chemotherapy applied on women aged below 40. This could mean that the younger patients who fell victim to breast cancer could also have the possibility to conceive a child.
In Great Britain alone, annually, some 5,500 women come down with breast cancer before they reach menopause. Experts in the United Kingdom believe these women would be greatly advantaged by medicine such as Zoladex, also known as goserelin, which is taken monthly in the form of an implant placed under the skin of the abdomen. This drug has been initially used in the treatment of prostate cancer, but it is now successfully used in the treatment of breast cancer as well.
The breast cancer drugs are more sensitive to hormones, namely they are stimulated by estrogen. Some two thirds of breast cancer cases are sensitive to hormones. The latest study unfolded in the United Kingdom, which involved 12,000 women, revealed that these drugs boost the action of chemotherapy and Tamoxifen. This form of doubled treatment reduces the recurrence of cancer by 13% and the risk of death by 15%. And the most important thing is that women can truly protect their fertility and pursue a somewhat normal life, despite the drawbacks brought by this dreadful disease.
After the surgical intervention for the removal of tumors, the drugs are used to reduce or block the production of estrogen, thus removing the risk of cancer recurrence. Even though chemotherapy is efficient in stopping the fabrication of estrogen by the ovaries, it also reduces or eliminates fertility and has more unpleasant side effects, such as the loss of hair.
Breast cancer drugs act on the pituitary gland that produces a hormone which stimulates the ovaries to produce estrogen. After the completion of the treatment, after some two years, the ovaries resume normal activity. According to studies, the combination of Avastin with chemotherapy could double the chances of survival for women with breast cancer. Patients who cannot be treated with Herceptin, another medicine fighting the affliction, can increase their chances for recovery using a treatment that cuts the blood flow to the tumors.
Avastin is created to block the nutrients that feed the tumors, and it has been demonstrated that it significantly slows down the disease. The drug, already used in the treatment of bowel cancer, has been administered together with the chemotherapy drug Taxol. The two drugs fight the cancer on different levels. The chemo attacks the tumor, while Avastin prevents the formation of blood vessels, removing the nutrients. The cancer remained stable for 11.4 months in women who took the two medicine combined, as opposed to 6.11 in patients who took Taxol alone. The study shows an increased life expectancy rate in 80% of breast cancer patients, who have tumors with a different genetic pattern, which Herceptin cannot treat.