Triple Negative Breast Cancer, "I Won't Back Down!": Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Thrives by Producing its Own Growth Factors

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.

Friday, July 12, 2013

Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Thrives by Producing its Own Growth Factors

"The study identified new targeted therapies for patients with triple-negative breast cancer focused on signaling molecules called cytokines, which are essentially hormones produced by the cells to tell breast cancer cells to grow."

"This study also found strategies that can be used to target the hormones' ability to stimulate cancer, including blocking the cytokines' receptors, suppressing the production of the IL-6 hormone, or blocking an intracellular signaling molecule that transmits the IL-6 and IL-8 signal to tell the cell to grow."

"Any of those strategies causes the suppression of triple-negative breast cancer growth," says Brown. "There are available antibodies to the IL-6 receptor and inhibitors of the intracellular kinases called STAT proteins. These drugs are available for clinical trials to treat triple-negative breast cancer."

http://www2.mdanderson.org/cancerfrontline/2013/07/triple-negative-breast-cancer-thrives-by-producing-its-own-growth-factors.html (Click to story)