estrogen-lowering drugs

Human breast tumors transplanted into mice are excellent models of metastatic cancer and are providing insights into how to attack breast cancers that no longer respond to the drugs used to treat them, according to research led by Matthew J. Ellis, MD, PhD, from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

Decoding the DNA of patients with advanced breast cancer has allowed scientists to identify distinct cancer “signatures” that could help predict which women are most likely to benefit from estrogen-lowering therapy, while sparing others from unnecessary treatment.

In the first large trial of its kind in the United States, researchers have shown that estrogen-lowering drugs can shrink tumors and reduce mastectomy rates for patients with stage 2 or 3 breast cancer.