Conference turris::womannotes-v3

877.0. "Best time to beat breast cancer?" by BTOVT::THIGPEN_S (green, with flowers) Thu Jun 13 1991 00:20

    I know! I said I wasn't gonna note!  But I saw this in Science News and
    immediately thought of posting it here.  Mods, I'm sorry if it should
    go elsewhere; I should be asleep so I took the lazy route and just
    typed it in.  Move it if need be.  I'm just boppin' in and out...
    Sara  (p.s. thank god for touch typing class in 10th grade.)
    
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    Women who schedule breast cancer surgery to coincide with certain days
    of the menstrual cycle may improve their chance of long-term survival,
    according to a controversal new report.
    
    Ian S. Fentiman and his colleagues at Guy's Hosp. in London, England,
    based their hypothesis on the knowledge that some breast tumors need
    the hormone estrogen to grow, and that the hormone progesterone
    counteracts estrogen's growth message.  They speculated that women with
    breast tumors who undergo surgery on days when the body produces lots of
    estrogen but little or no progesterone would run the greatest risk of a
    deadly cancer recurrence.  Unopposed estrogen, they reasoned, could
    fuel the proliferation of any tiny "seeds" of cancer that eluded the
    surgical knife.
    
    To test the hypothesis, they studied the medical charts of 249 women
    with breast cancer tumors removed between 1975 and 1985.  The team
    identified 75 women in this group who had gone into surgery 3 to 12
    days after their last menstrual period began - a time when estrogen is
    plentiful and progesterone is scant.  They then compared the long-term
    survival rates of these patients with those of the 174 women whose
    operations had been performed at all other times of the cycle.  At the
    time of surgery, the latter group had either very low estrogen levels
    or high levels of both estrogen and progesterone.
    
    On average, the women undergoing breast surgery on days 3 to 12 had a
    54% chance of surviving for another 10 years, while the rest of the
    group had an 84% chance of 10-yr survival, the team reports in the May
    25 _Lancet_.  The gap in death rates showed up even when the
    researchers statistically controlled for other factors, such as tumor
    size, that can affect longevity after breast cancer surgery, they say.
    
    The team now advises physicians to schedule breast cancer surgery
    during the second half of a patient's cycle.
    
    Others remain unconvinced.  F. Andrew Dorr of the (U.S.) National Cancer
    Institute notes that previous findings do not support the new results,
    and questions the precision of menstrual data based on patients'
    recollections.

    
    i don't remember enough human physiology to know what sorts of
    hormonal cycles post-menopausal women have or do not have. does
    anyone know that right off the top of their head and can they
    relate it to the base note?
    

    According to a book on hysterectomy that I read a few weeks ago,
    estrogen and progesterone are practicly non-existant, hence the need
    for hormone replacement therapy (HRT).  I don't remember how that
    related to the issuse of breast cancer (I have to book on order, I had
    to  give the library their book back), but it did have an impact.  When
    I get the book, I'll look it up and post another note.
    
    Karen