5 targeted therapies?

[kristen]

This was on Fox news last night, the caption makes you think that being younger and on chemo that your at a higher risk for complications. Then it goes on saying that you are, but in the end, what other options are there at this point? And the complications weren't that bad,( fever, dehydration, low platelets) It would be great if there weren't any and it's better then the alternative....at least for this board or are we at a point where Herceptin is the only drug required at a certain stage without chemo?

http://news.monstersandcritics.com/h..._than_believed

It goes on to say that they have identified 5 distinct BC and are targeting therapy for them. I know one! Does anyone know the other 4? Just curious. Thank you.

[Christine MH-UK]

Unfortunately, the two sources I remembered list very different possibilities and only specify four each:


From Harold J. Burstein, The Distinctive Nature of Her2-Positive Breast Cancers, New England Journal of Medicne.
[left]Hormone receptors, HER2, and increasingly, genomic profiles distinguish at least four major classes of breast cancer: HER2-positive tumors; HER2-negative, hormonereceptor–positive tumors, which can be divided into two classes, favorable and unfavorable, on the basis of genomic and pathobiologic features; and basal-like tumors that express neither HER2 nor hormone receptors.

I am not sure what the fifth type would be, although I remember one of Lani's postings suggesting that slightly her2 cancers were perhaps another subtype.

Another four possibilities come from the "Defeat Cancer" project website:
http://www.worldcommunitygrid.org/p...wHdcResearch.do

Subclasses of Cancer
"Within broad categories of cancer – such as breast, liver, or lung, there are subclasses of cancer. Breast cancer, for example, is a broad category that consists of a number of subclasses (including intraductal, lobular, medullary, colloid), which exhibit variation in terms of aggressiveness and which require specific treatments and drug regimens. So rather than looking at breast cancer as a single disease, doctors must treat it as a multitude of diseases, each requiring targeted therapies."

I suspect that the five types are just a start anyway. Part of the purpose of the Help Defeat Cancer project is to figure out the genetic commonalities that distinguish different cancer subtypes and what existing treatments have been most effective (similar to the recent finding that FEC is much better than CMF for her2positive breast cancer). The project is relying on donated computer time to analyze hundreds of thousands of breast cancer and head and neck cancer samples over the next three months and the hope is that this will enable the faster development of better targeted therapies.

The only disappointing thing about the project is that it requires 750MB of RAM to participate in the cancer project, although there are also less memory intensive biomedical projects running on the World Community Grid involving folding proteins relevant to disease and screening potential AIDS drugs. All of the knowledge developed remains in the public domain

[koolbreeze]

Hi, I just recently saw this video clip on Inflammatory Breast Cancer. This is a dangerous type of cancer that is not usually found until the later stages. It can appear as a redness or rash on the breast and is sometimes misdiagnosed by medical professionals. I urge all of you to watch this clip found at the web site below and pass this information along to others. Most of the people I have forwarded this clip to have responded that they were unaware of this type of breast cancer. The clip is only 6 mins. and well worth the time.

http://www.komotv.com/ibc/

[sarah]

Dear Kirsten,
Realize that Fox TV gets viewers by alarming people so they are going to make anything - whatever they report - look really frightening otherwise why would people tune in? As you pointed out even the Fox report said the complications, while annoying, weren't that bad. Perhaps if you looked at the stats that resulted in life threatening complications they would point to older people??? So look for information from more even-handed, reliable medical sources before feeling worried. Anyway, aren't we all going to beat the stats!
take care, be well,
sarah

[Lani]

by genetic profile (not by appearance under the microscope) are:
luminal A and B, her2, basal and normal. Luminal A includes her2+ER+ and her2 group only includes er=her2+s. They are discovering subsubclasses within these, but have not named them yet. Hope this helps!

[kristen]

thank you all so much, I think I have a better handle on this. Hope you are all doing well.