Letrozole vs. Tamoxifen
Posted 10/27/2011
Posted in
This is a very important piece of information. You likely are aware that there have been long-running studies to compare the efficacy of tamoxifen vs. letrozole (Femara, one of the AIs) in reducing recurrences in post-menopausal women. This is a short summary from the New York Times re a recent Lancet article. If you have time and interest to read more, I also am including the Lancet link.
Regimens: Better Blocker of Breast
Cancer Recurrence
By ANAHAD O'CONNOR
The breast cancer drug letrozole reduces the chances that a woman's cancer will return and improves her odds of survival to a greater degree than tamoxifen, a widely used estrogen blocker, according to a new analysis.
The study is the latest installment in a long-running trial comparing treatment after surgery in postmenopausal women who have breast cancers that are estrogen-receptor positive, or sensitive to estrogen. Those cases account for about 60 percent of all breast cancers. The study involved 8,010 women and looked at two treatments: letrozole (brand name Femara) or tamoxifen taken alone for five years or both drugs taken in sequence, one for two years followed by the other for three years. The women were followed for more than eight years on average.
Women given letrozole for five years after surgery had a 20 percent lower risk of breast cancer recurrence and were 21 percent less likely to die during the study, compared with those who were given only tamoxifen, long the gold standard. Neither combination of drugs significantly lowered the likelihood of recurrence or death compared with taking letrozole alone, researchers found.
The study was published online this month in The Lancet Oncology and was financed in part by the National Cancer Institute and Novartis, the maker of letrozole.
http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanonc/article/PIIS1470-2045(11)70270-4/abstract
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