2:37 AM
McGhori
In the battle against breast cancer, modern chemotherapy drugs are now reducing death rates by more than one-third.
There is also promising news for women who are battling breast cancer and undergoing chemotherapy. A new study from Oxford University that was recently published in The Lancet medical journal has shown that modern chemotherapy drugs are reducing breast cancer death rates.
The study included data from 123 trials conducted over the past four decades involving about 100,000 women. Findings showed that standard while chemotherapy treatments in the 1980s reduced breast cancer mortality by nearly one-quarter, the effectiveness of modern chemo drugs cut the death rates by about one-third when compared to patients not undergoing chemotherapy.
The positive impact was applicable to all women regardless of age, tumor size, level of spread, and whether or not the cancer was sensitive to oestrogen. However, for ER-positive cancers, which are sensitive to oestrogen, a combination of chemotherapy and hormone (endocrine) therapy was found to be more effective than hormone treatment alone.
Yet another study warns that a faster form of radiation therapy, which is quickly gaining popularity for women having early-stage breast cancer, may not be as effective or as safe as conventional radiation treatment.
The study included the Medicare records of over 130,000 women. Findings revealed that women who opted for the faster treatment, known as brachytherapy, had about double the likelihood of having to undergo a mastectomy within the following five years compared to those who underwent conventional whole breast radiation.
Brachytherapy uses a catheter to deliver radiation directly into the cavity that remains after a tumor is surgically removed by lumpectomy. Due to concentrating the radiation in the affected area, duration of treatment is as short as one week, versus the six to seven weeks necessary for completion of whole breast radiation therapy. According to the study, the use of brachytherapy among Medicare patients jumped from less than one percent in 2000, to 13 percent of those receiving lumpectomy and radiation in 2007.
During the same eight-year period, about 4 percent of patients treated with brachytherapy underwent a mastectomy in the following five years, compared to only 2.2 percent of those treated with whole breast irradiation. In addition, brachytherapy was associated with a higher rate of infections, rib fractures, fat necrosis and breast pain.
Posted in: HEALTH
