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MONDAY, DEC. 14, 2009
By Musa Mayer
The 2009 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium is now over, and the
more than 8,400 attendees are on their way home to 97 countries around
the world. After an evening spent with my advocate friends enjoying
some Tex-Mex in San Antonio, I’ll be homeward bound, well fed in body
and, even more importantly, well fed in spirit.
Every year, I look to this meeting for the inspiration that will
sustain me in my work with women who are living with metastatic breast
cancer and their families. Like them, I am looking for hope. “You are
our eyes and ears,” one woman wrote me in an e-mail I received during
the conference. “What do you think were the biggest revelations at this
year’s conference? Any disappointments? Any surprises?” Read more ...
SUNDAY, DEC. 13, 2009
Posted by Musa Mayer
Most women diagnosed with breast cancer have tumors that grow in the
presence of estrogen. The anti-estrogen therapies that have been
developed to treat these tumors cut the risk for cancer
recurrence in half, and reduce deaths by about one-third. Tamoxifen,
which has been used and researched for decades, works by binding to the
estrogen receptor, which keeps estrogen from getting into the cancer
cells to stimulate their growth.
The newer aromatase inhibitors (AI), which include letrozole
(Femara), anastrozole (Arimidex) and exemestane (Aromasin), appear to
be even more effective in reducing recurrence and death. The AIs, as
they are called, work in a different way than tamoxifen does. These
drugs inhibit an enzyme called aromatase, which converts androgens
(male hormones) to estrogen. Unlike tamoxifen, which can be used by
both pre- and postmenopausal women, the AIs can only be used by
postmenopausal women. Read more ...
SATURDAY, DEC. 12. 2009
Posted by Musa Mayer
There has never been a more fruitful or hopeful time in breast cancer
research, particularly in the arena of drug development. In its 2009 report (Adobe Acrobat Reader required),
the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, the
professional organization of the pharmaceutical industry, lists more
than 800 cancer medicines currently in clinical trials, with 106 in
breast cancer alone. Many more treatments are in a translational phase
of development, moving up from basic or laboratory science and tests in
animal models (usually mice or rats) to testing in women with
metastatic breast cancer. Below I discuss just a few of the many
abstracts and oral presentations that presented data on targeted agents
in clinical development here at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium
in Texas. Read more ...
FRIDAY, DEC. 11, 2009
Posted by Musa Mayer
Every year, in early December, I’m irresistibly drawn to Texas, and
the annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium (SABCS), where I gather
with 9,000 others to learn what insights the past year has yielded
about breast cancer causes, prevention and treatment. A joint effort of
the American Association for Cancer Research, Baylor College of
Medicine and the University of Texas Health Science Center, the SABCS
is the largest scientific meeting in the world dedicated exclusively to
breast cancer research. For me, the anticipation begins even before I
arrive, spotting fellow advocates and oncologists I know at the airport.
Valerie Beral, an epidemiologist at the University of Oxford in
England, opened this year’s conference with a plenary session on the
causes and prevention of breast cancer. This was hardly new
information, yet I found it compelling.
“Why,” Beral asked, “does breast cancer vary across the world so
dramatically?” She noted that the cumulative incidence of breast cancer
until age 70, by percentage of the population, is only about 1 percent
in rural Africa and Asia. In contrast, in developed countries, the
cumulative incidence is six- to seven-fold higher, with breast cancer
affecting 6 percent of women by age 70. Furthermore, while the rates of
new breast cancers have apparently stabilized in developed countries
like the U.S., the rates are now rising steeply—just as they did here
30 to 40 years ago—in the crowded cities of the developing world. Read more ...