Study Reveals New Data Into Cause And Treatments For Aggressive Triple Negative Breast Cancer (TNBC)
Source: Thailand Medical News Nov 12, 2019 6 years, 3 months, 2 weeks, 19 hours, 7 minutes ago
A new joint study by the University of Leeds and the University of Aberdeen have identified potential environmental risk factors and new targets for treating an aggressive form of
breast cancer.The new data was presented at the Society for Endocrinology annual conference in Brighton. The study suggests that exposure to common chemicals in our everyday environment may increase the risk of developing a difficult to treat type of
breast cancer and highlights strategies for new treatment using combination therapy.
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TNBC or
Triple negative breast cancer is an aggressive form that particularly affects younger females and makes up 10-20% of all
breast cancer diagnoses. Although still curable if caught early,
TNBC is resistant to hormone treatments and newer "targeted" therapies, used to treat other types of
breast cancer;
TNBC is, therefore, treated with surgery, radiotherapy and chemotherapy. There is a need to better understand the biology of
TNBC, to help develop new therapies to improve the survival and quality of life for patients with
TNBC and also to identify how people might reduce their risk of developing this disease.
Conventional hormonal therapies used to treat women with another type of
breast cancer that is "hormone receptor positive", target oestrogen and progesterone receptors, two of 48 nuclear receptors (NRs). We know that many NRs are altered in
breast cancer,and are both potential drivers of
breast cancer development and possible new therapeutic targets. NRs act as environmental sensors, working together to control different aspects of how
breast and other tissues work. Their activity is altered by environmental factors, but how environmental chemicals change NR activity is not well understood, particularly in the context of TNBC.
Professor Chris Twelves from the University of Leeds, with Professor Valerie Speirs from the University of Aberdeen and Dr. Laura Matthews also from the University Of Leeds, led a study funded by the charity
Breast Cancer UK. They mapped the entire NR superfamily in samples from different types of
breast cancer and from normal breast tissue, to identify common alterations in NR activity. They then compared their findings with those from other studies to identify NRs associated specifically with
TNBC. This allows them to predict which drugs or environmental chemicals are more likely to generate the distinct NR profiles associated with
TNBC; these include disinfectants, insecticides, dietary fats and industrial pollutants.
"Identifying these NR networks, and ways they might be controlled in patients with
TNBC is really important. We are now investigating how the environmental chemicals change the behaviour of normal
breast cells so we can understand how they might drive
cancer development. We are also testing whether using drug combinations that target multiple NRs at the same time might prevent or be an effective treatment for
TNBC. Our goal is to red
uce the number of people that develop
breast cancer, and guide new therapies, so that more people can live beyond
breast cancer." commented Dr Laura Matthews in an interview with
Thailand Medical News.
Reference: : Society for Endocrinology annual conference in Brighton 2019, Abstract P130: Nuclear receptor profiling predicts chemical disruptors as risk factors for developing breast cancer
