Bisphosphonates in early stage BC

[*_Julie_*]

After listening to the teleconference yesterday about Breast Cancer and bone health I am just wondering if any of you stage 2 or 3 are taking Bisphosphonates like Zometa for prevention of bone mets.
According to the oncologists on the call if you can prevent bone mets that might itself prevent the other mets(I am not sure these are the exact words she said).

thanks,
Julie

[Laurie S]

I am stage 2, and still doing my chemo, but I was planning on talking to my onc about taking it once I was done with treatment. I am afraid he will say no b/c he seems very conservative, waiting until something is standard protocol before prescribing it . I read somewhere that studies were mixed on whether there was a benefit for early stage bc patients. I would be willing to take it if he would prescribe it. Are there alot of side effects or serious risks involved with bisphosphonates?
Laurie

[*_anne_*]

Hi there,
I was reading about this about 2-3 months ago on breastcancer.org and the conclusions were that biophosponates could be bad in ER - tumors for early stage BC. The study was done in Europe and they did not use Zometa, but some other biophosphonate. I will ck the site to see if I can find it again.
Anne