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Aromatase Inhibitors: Did you decide to go on them or not?
Breast Cancer | Last Active: May 12, 2023 | Replies (1190)Comment receiving replies
You are right: I was at best being approximate. The score can be 8, the risk can be 6 without meds, and the risk with meds can be 3, for instance. The Oncotpye gives score and risk and % risk reduction, which is approximately 50% of the stated risk, not 50% of the score (as I implied).
Other tests consider 5% "high risk." t is counterintuitive perhaps, but that is the case. In a room of 20, one person.
It is also good to distinguish between local recurrence and distant spread. Does Oncotype now do that?
Replies to "You are right: I was at best being approximate. The score can be 8, the risk..."
Alas, I don't see a differentiation between local disant recurrence and spread. The senior member of the science team at Oncotype told me they tend to think the risk score covers both IF the tumor margins were adequate and clean but their legal counsel recommends against making such a statement. I think it's interesting that they also discover undiagnosed invasive cancers sometimes. The cells behave differently when tested and they've had to notify doctors to re-examine the patient and rethink recommendations for treatment. Talking to the people at Oncotype was very informative and welcome.
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One thing my onco-radiologist mentioned to me was: even though my risk of recurrence is 5% with the AI's and 6% on Tamoxifen (which I'm on) in the next nine years and my Oncotype score was 17 so no chemo. That said my tumor grade was 3 so when I was struggling with side effects from the AI's and I spoke to him he said "try to make them work due to the aggressiveness of your tumor. So although it was caught early, was small IDC I've been strongly encouraged to continue working through side effects (not as many for me with tamoxifen) and stay the course!
Has anyone on this chat board been made aware of the big discovery by U of I Urbana of the ErSO molecule that eradicated tumors in 3 days in mice and dogs and Bayer licensed it and intended to do clinical trials and it just disappeared with a small statement from Bayer about not moving forward with clinical trials due to "more scientific research" which of course needs to be done but sounds like they aren't moving forward with the testing of the drug....
In a statement Bayer wrote in part: “Following a thorough assessment of ERSO in preclinical studies, Bayer has decided to discontinue development activities of this program for scientific reasons… we must take prudent steps to ensure the compounds have the potential to provide the therapeutic benefits we are striving to achieve for patients with cancer.”
Promising research discoveries in their early stages may not succeed. It can take 12 to 21 years for a drug to go from promise in test tubes to becoming an accepted new treatment. Many test tub (in vitro) and mice (in vivo) studies never make it to human trials.