Triple Negative Breast Cancer, "I Won't Back Down!": Dr. Lisa Newman Hope To Correlate African Ancestry To Triple Negative Breast Cancer

What is TNBC

WHAT IS TRIPLE NEGATIVE BREAST CANCER?

Just in recent years, Triple Negative Breast Cancer (TNBC) has sparked interest in the news where instead of calling the tumor as ER-negative, PR-negative, and HER2-negative; researchers began using the shorthand term, "Triple Negative," dubbed the "new type" of breast cancer. Being Triple Negative, you don't have a targeted therapy and your only treatment option is chemotherapy.

Triple Negative Breast Cancer is seen in about 15% of all breast cancers. TNBC is a very aggressive cancer that tends to strike younger women, pre-menopause, especially among African-American women and women who have BRCA1 mutations. The tumor tends to be fast growing and is less likely to show up on an annual mammogram. TNBC is more likely to metastasis early on; has a high rate of recurrence in the first 2-3 years from diagnosis and has a poorer prognosis than other types of breast cancer due to lack of specific, targeted treatment for TNBC.

Tuesday, June 12, 2012

Dr. Lisa Newman Hope To Correlate African Ancestry To Triple Negative Breast Cancer

Dr. Lisa Newman

"We are very interested in looking at whether or not African ancestry in and of itself might actually predispose women to a biologically more aggressive form of breast cancer, such as the triple negative breast cancer."

Sixty percent of Ghanaian women who have breast cancer have triple negative breast cancer, according to Newman.

"Western sub-Saharan Africa is an important geographic location to focus on because that's where many of the slave colonies were located several hundred years ago," says Newman.

http://surgery.med.umich.edu/news/?p=743
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/07/21/bia.triple.negative.cancer/index.html
(click link to story)

"The study, published in Cancer, finds women in Ghana are more likely than American women to test negative for each of the three markers. Among women with breast cancer the largest percentage testing triple negative were the African women -- 82 percent -- followed by African-American women -- 26 percent -- and white American women -- 16 percent."

Read more: http://www.upi.com/Health_News/2010/07/26/Blacks-have-higher-breast-cancer-risk/UPI-92151280184542/#ixzz1xcBKeF8C