Breast cancer
Preventing recurrence: 13 larger doses of radiotherapy offer as good a protection as the international standard 25 smaller doses
Giving breast cancer patients fewer but larger doses of radiotherapy may be as safe and as effective at reducing the risk of cancer returning, according to Cancer Research UK trial results published in Lancet Oncology on 30 May.
Led by Professor John Yarnold, of The Institute of Cancer Research and The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust, a team of researchers at The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust, the Gloucestershire Oncology Centre, The Institute of Cancer Research and the University of Wisconsin, tested an experimental schedule of 13 larger doses that appears to offer the same protection against cancer returning in the same breast as the international standard of 25 smaller doses, without any increase in side effects.
The study’s preliminary findings could lead to simpler more effective radiotherapy treatment as well as a reduction in hospital visits for patients, lessening anxiety. Ultimately, health service cost-saving would also result.
Generally, patients receive radiotherapy treatment once daily, from Monday to Friday, for five weeks. The 10-year trial followed 1,410 women who had a lumpectomy after treatment for early breast cancer followed by different radiotherapy treatments. The women were randomly divided into three groups to rule out any bias. One group received the standard treatment of 25 doses in five weeks; the other two groups were given 13 doses in two slightly larger amounts over the same period. The researchers then monitored the three groups and showed that a regimen of 13 doses can apparently offer an outcome at least as good as the standard treatment.
‘We think it should be possible to give fewer but higher daily doses of radiotherapy to the breast to prevent cancer from returning without harming the patient’s healthy tissues,’ said Prof. Yarnold. ‘However, we will have to wait for the results of our further trials that have followed this study before we can confirm that the strategy is more effective than the standard treatment in the long term’
This article was published on 07/01/2006