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For women over 40, mammography is a necessary yet annoying procedure to endure every year or two. The technique, while valuable for reducing breast cancer deaths, is less than ideal because it exposes patients to X-ray radiation and requires their breasts to be painfully squished between plates. The plates flatten the breast so the X-rays can more easily pass through […]
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Countless breast cancer patients in the future will be spared millions of dollars of chemotherapy thanks in part to something that millions of Americans did that cost them just pennies: bought a postage stamp. Proceeds from the U.S. Postal Service’s breast cancer stamp put researchers over the top when they were trying to get enough money to do the landmark […]
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New findings from the groundbreaking Trial Assigning Individualized Options for Treatment (Rx), or TAILORx trial, show no benefit from chemotherapy for 70 percent of women with the most common type of breast cancer. The study found that for women with hormone receptor (HR)-positive, HER2-negative, axillary lymph node¬-negative breast cancer, treatment with chemotherapy and hormone therapy after surgery is not more […]
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Many cancer patients seek out gentle, movement-based stretching techniques such as yoga, tai chi and qigong, but does stretching have an effect on cancer? While many animal studies have attempted to quantify the effects of exercise on the disease, results have been mixed. Furthermore, studies in animals involve levels of vigorous exercise that can be difficult for cancer patients. Investigators […]
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Clinicians and researchers at Queen Mary University of London and the Homerton Hospital are encouraging black women to visit their GP if they notice any changes in their breasts. The call comes following the publication of a Queen Mary research paper which shows that among black women, breast cancer is often still perceived as “a disease of whiteness”. The study, […]
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For years, doctors have associated the BRCA1 and BRCA2 gene mutations with an increased risk of breast cancer. But researchers at Texas A&M University have now identified another gene that may have an impact on breast cancer—associated with the body’s circadian rhythm. Texas A&M College of Veterinary Medicine & Biomedical Sciences (CVM) professor Weston Porter and his team have found […]
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Jean-François Côté, a researcher at the Montreal Clinical Research Institute (IRCM) and professor at Université de Montréal’s Faculty of Medicine, studies metastasis, the leading cause of cancer-related death. Recently, his team uncovered a protein that, once deactivated, could prevent the development of metastases in an aggressive type of cancer, HER2-positive breast cancer. One in eight women will be diagnosed with […]
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The breast cancer drug lapatinib which is designed to shrink tumours can sometimes cause them to grow in the lab, according to a new study published in eLife. By understanding the molecular basis of this phenomenon, scientists hope that their findings will lead to safer treatment decision-making and drug design in the future. Lapatinib is used in combination with other […]
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As many as one in three women treated for breast cancer undergo unnecessary procedures, but a new method for diagnosing it could do a better job distinguishing between benign and aggressive tumors. Researchers at the University of Michigan are developing a pill that makes tumors light up when exposed to infrared light, and they have demonstrated that the concept works […]
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Quality of life for women treated with a more targeted radiotherapy treatment – called accelerated partial breast irradiation – is at least as good as quality of life for women treated with standard radiotherapy, according to research presented at the ESTRO 37 conference and published simultaneously in The Lancet Oncology. The treatment uses small tubes to deliver a higher dose […]
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