A team of scientists in the Netherlands has discovered a genetic protein marker that could save breast cancer patients from undergoing unnecessary chemotherapy treatment, reports the Lancet. The research conducted at the Erasmus medical school in Rotterdam identified a signature of 76 genes that predicted which patients would go on to develop cancer in another part of the body within five years. Currently, no reliable diagnostic tools exist to predict which breast cancer patients are most likely to relapse. John Foekens and his team focused on a condition called lymph-node negative breast cancer. If diagnosed in time (when the cancer has not spread to the lymph nodes), up to 70 per cent of breast cancer patients who are given surgery or radiotherapy for the disease are cured. However, the treatment is usually followed by chemotherapy of hormone treatment as a precaution to prevent recurrence. Yet many women do not actually need the follow-up therapy. With this new diagnostic tool, Dr Foekens hopes to spare low-risk patients from unnecessary treatment.
