Genetic Test May Identify Which Cancer Patients Can Avoid Chemotherapy And

“The study also shows that children suffer more from prematurity than from chemotherapy, so avoiding prematurity is more important than avoiding chemotherapy”, said Professor Frédéric Amant in a press release via EurekAlert!

For the trial, women whose tumors scored 10 or lower only received hormone therapy rather than chemotherapy.

The results of the experiments conducted for the study showed that women who chose to skip chemotherapy, after the test revealed that it was ok for them to do so, didn’t even have a 1 percent (1%) chance of experiencing cancer reoccurrence sometime in the next one (1) to five (5) years. “The recurrence risk was less than 2-percent through five years of follow up”, said Dr. Harold Burstein with the Susan F. Smith Center for Women’s Cancers at Dana- Farber.

A landmark trial has discovered a new 21-gene test that can help breast cancer patients skip chemotherapy.

Using the Oncotype DX test, the researchers found that 16% of the study participants were at low risk for breast cancer recurrence (a score of 10 or less), 67% were at intermediate risk (a score of 11-25), while 17% were at high risk for recurrence (a score of 26 or higher).

Researchers may have made the decision considerably easy for pregnant women who get diagnosed with cancer while they are still carrying a child.

The study focuses on the most common type of breast cancer: early stage that is hormone positive. Over 100,000 women in the USA along are diagnosed with breast cancer every year. Low risk and intermediate scorers were selected for hormone blocking drugs.

In the 10,000 women, the tumors had not yet spread to the lymph nodes, but had features that generally meant they should be given chemotherapy paired with endocrine therapy pills (like tamoxifen).

Her doctor, Javed Ahinwari, will tell you not all breast cancer patients need it, and now there is a test to figure out who does. The test measures the activity of genes that control cell growth to indicate the tumor’s likely response to hormone therapy treatment.

The development of those children’s heart function and mental processes was normal compared with an age-matched group of other children in the population at large, the researchers have reported in the New England Journal of Medicine.

The European study emphasized, however, that the women in the study did not receive treatment during the first 12 to 14 weeks of their pregnancy when the risk of birth defects is greatest. The overall survival rate was 98 percent. About 94 percent were free of any invasive cancer, including new cancers at other sites or in the opposite breast.

“That means we treat patients with less complicated, less toxic-type treatments with less side effects, and still have the same benefits”, Dr. Nagpal said.

“I was convinced that there was no indication for chemotherapy”.