Searching For The Right Genes

by Sharon Udasin
Staff Writer

Women with breast cancer have seen a modest increase in survival rates over the past decade, as both prophylactic and combative treatment options become more widely available, and as expertise in genetics and molecular biology continue to expand on the clinical level.

In this context, Jewish women in particular may benefit from genetic testing to determine whether or not they have BRCA1 and 2 gene deficiencies, which make one more susceptible to breast and ovarian cancers. Worldwide, breast cancer patients can also benefit now from hormonal chemotherapy treatments like tamoxifen, which inhibits estrogen from binding to its receptor, and herceptin, which inhibits the over-expressed HER2 cancer-causing growth factor receptor protein.

But what about those women — and men — who don’t respond to these targeted drugs, and therefore must be subjected to general chemotherapy? (While the majority of breast cancer patients are women, men also get breast cancer.)  Continue reading…