Breast Cancer

Hope S. Rugo, MD, professor of medicine and director of breast oncology and clinical trials education at the University of California, San Francisco, Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center, discusses the treatment of patients with metastatic breast cancer with chemotherapy.

The decision about whether to get tested for a genetic mutation that may predispose a person to certain cancers is a difficult one for many patients to make. Even more difficult for mutation carriers is deciding whether to undergo a prophylactic surgical procedure.

Breast cancer clinicians today are faced with an ever-expanding number of older patients, yet determining the most appropriate treatment for these individuals can be challenging.

Patrick Borgen, MD, chair, Department of Surgery, director, Maimonides Breast Cancer Center, discusses a patient's decision to be tested for a BRCA gene.

Emanuel F. "Chip" Petricoin III, PhD, Co-Director, Center for Applied Proteomics & Molecular Medicine, Professor of Life Sciences, George Mason University, discusses the discovery of new biomarkers in breast cancer.

While chemotherapy might initially be effective in the treatment of patients with metastatic breast cancer, it is very common for patients to develop resistance to such agents.

Researchers are attempting to determine if targeting more than one tyrosine kinase provide a greater benefit in several clinical trials involving the investigational drug afatinib.

A high-profile case of a medical decision being based primarily on the results of a genetic test has prompted a national discussion on the benefits and risks associated with acting on the results of such a test.

The technological advances in analyzing the human genome have spawned a new era in breast cancer as well as other types of malignancies that will affect oncology practice and will necessitate dramatic changes in the clinical trials system.

Anees Chagpar, MD, MSc, MA, MPH, Associate Professor of Surgery (Oncology), Director, The Breast Center at Smilow Cancer Hospital at Yale-New Haven, gives an overview of the discussion surrounding sentinel node biopsying before and after neoadjuvant chemotherapy.

The I-SPY trials are designed to test several different experimental therapies at once to determine which ones work best in which patients.

Despite progress in treating chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting, especially in the acute phase up to 24 hours after treatment, the condition is still one of the side effects patients fear most.

José Baselga, MD, PhD, Physician-in-Chief, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, discusses the need to fine tune mTOR and PI3K inhibitor doses.

For appropriate patients, postmastectomy radiation therapy is associated with improved locoregional control and better survival.

Hyman B. Muss, MD, Professor of Medicine, Director of Geriatric Oncology, Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, discusses evaluation tools for treating older patients.

Due to the high lifetime risk of ovarian cancer and the poor ovarian cancer surveillance options available, women who carry BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutations are advised to remove their ovaries and fallopian tubes by age 40 or when childbearing is complete.

Gunter von Minckwitz, MD, PhD, discusses the current unsolved medical situation regarding patients with breast cancer who do not respond to treatment.

Debu Tripathy, MD, from the University of Southern California Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center, discusses the targeted therapies that are currently available for the treatment of patients with breast cancer.

Lisa A. Carey, MD, Professor of Medicine, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, discusses the present and future state of clinical trial design.

Experts provide an in-depth look at the treatment strategy in patients with solid tumors, specifically looking at the role of maintenance therapy.

A large, international study has yielded a wealth of new information about genetic alterations that can increase an individual's risk of breast, prostate, and ovarian cancer.

Laura Esserman, MD, MBA, Professor, University of California, San Francisco, discusses screening patients with higher-risk DCIS.

Mark D. Pegram, MD, from the Stanford Cancer Institute, describes the combination of pertuzumab and trastuzumab as a treatment for patients with HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer.

While radiotherapy can be an effective treatment for early-stage breast cancer, incidental irradiation of the heart during treatment may increase the risk of developing ischemic heart disease.

With increasing use of neoadjuvant chemotherapy in early-stage breast cancer, controversy has erupted regarding the optimal timing of sentinel lymph node biopsy.