Improval surviva from breast cancer

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/12/121205090917.htm

ScienceDaily (Dec. 5, 2012) — Ten years of adjuvant treatment with tamoxifen provided women with estrogen receptor-positive breast cancer greater protection against late recurrence and death from breast cancer compared with the current standard of five years of tamoxifen, according to the international ATLAS (Adjuvant Tamoxifen -- Longer Against Shorter) study.

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"The main additional benefit from continuing tamoxifen treatment is to reduce breast cancer mortality during the second decade after diagnosis," Davies said. "We already knew that five years of tamoxifen reduces breast cancer mortality in this late period by almost a third in comparison with no tamoxifen. We now know that 10 years of tamoxifen is even better, approximately halving breast cancer mortality during the second decade after diagnosis."

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http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/12/121205090915.htm

ScienceDaily (Dec. 5, 2012) — Black women with breast cancer were 12 percent less likely than white women with the disease to receive a more minimally invasive procedure -- sentinel lymph node biopsy -- for staging of breast cancer, according to data tracking the treatment of patients through 2007.

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http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/12/121205090909.htm

ScienceDaily (Dec. 5, 2012) — Increasing the dose of fulvestrant from 250 mg to 500 mg improved median overall survival in women with locally advanced or metastatic estrogen receptor-positive breast cancer, according to updated data from the CONFIRM trial presented at the 2012 CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium, held Dec. 4-8.

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"Of note, the improvement in survival with the higher dose of fulvestrant was achieved without increasing treatment toxicity. Indeed, the dose of 500 mg had the same toxicity profile as the 250-mg dose," said Angelo Di Leo, M.D., Ph.D., head of the department of medical oncology at the Hospital of Prato, Istituto Toscano Tumori in Prato, Italy.

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Among the entire study population, the 500-mg dose was associated with a clinically relevant 4.1-month difference in median overall survival compared with the lower dose: 26.4 months in the 500-mg group and 22.3 months in the 250-mg group. Researchers also saw a 19 percent reduction in risk for death in the 500-mg group compared with the 250-mg group. Serious adverse events occurred in 8.9 percent of patients who had received the 500-mg dose and in 6.7 percent of patients in the 250-mg group.

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