Early-stage breast cancer patients whose tumors carry genetic markers associated with a low risk of disease recurrence may not need chemotherapy, according to a new study that employed a test devised by UCSF researcher Laura van ’t Veer.
Using a genetic test known as MammaPrint, van ’t Veer and her colleagues were able to predict the risk of cancer recurrence by measuring the expression of a suite of 70 genes.
“For the first time, a prospective, randomized trial shows that the active biology of breast cancer in an individual, as assessed by the MammaPrint test, can assist in making a well-informed choice to undergo chemotherapy treatment or not,” said van ’t Veer.
An analysis of breast cancer isoforms developed at UCLA. Blue lines are associated with longer survival times, and magenta lines with shorter survival times.
Credit: Courtesy of Yi Xing/UCLA
Scientists also are working to help improve the accuracy of doctors’ prognoses for breast cancer patients.
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A new method developed by UCLA scientists opens new avenues for doing just that, using data about patients’ genetic sequences to produce more reliable projections for survival time and how they might respond to possible treatments.
To treat or not to treat? That is the question researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory hope to answer with a new advance, identifying 14 genes that could help doctors and their cancer patients decide if a particular therapy would be worth pursuing.
Meanwhile, UC San Diego researchers reported that precision medicine can lead to better outcomes for patients with cancer. After reviewing 346 phase one clinical trials involving 13,203 patients, the study authors found that patients who received targeted treatments had response rates 6 times higher than those who did not.
New hope for patients
There have been other important advances, too.
UCLA scientists, led by Dennis Slamon, helped develop the breast cancer drug Herceptin – which the FDA approved in 1998 – and their research played a key role in the development of Ibrance, a new drug to treat patients with advanced breast cancer. After patients in a clinical study led by UCLA researchers showed a dramatic improvement using Ibrance, the FDA granted the drug “breakthrough therapy” status, allowing it to be fast-tracked for approval last year.
UC Berkeley scientists recently found a target for treating one of the most deadly forms of breast cancer, known as “triple-negative” breast cancer. This form of breast cancer accounts for about 1 in 5 cases, and they are deadlier than other forms of breast cancer, in part because no drugs have been developed to specifically target these tumors.
Triple-negative breast cancers do not rely on the hormones estrogen and progesterone for growth, nor on human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2). Because they do not depend on these three targets, they do not respond to modern hormonal therapies or the HER2-targeted drug Herceptin.
In August, scientists announced that they had found a long-elusive Achilles’ heel within triple-negative breast tumors, and used a drug-lik molecule to successfully target this vulnerability, killing cancer cells in the lab and shrinking tumors in mice.
Such breakthroughs offer new hope to breast cancer patients. Courtney herself is now cancer-free, along with her three other family members.
“I am very grateful for the other problem solvers and entrepreneurs around the world who made that possible,” Courtney said.
