Advanced Breast Cancer Could Be Predicted with New Marker

Predicting which breast cancers will become advanced forms of the disease may have gotten easier with new research identifying a molecule that appears to indicate the progression of the disease. Researchers hope that such information will be able to inform patients and their doctors as they decide what the best forms of breast cancer treatment are for their particular prognosis.

A pathologist looks for three standard molecules that make tumors that could lead to breast cancer when diagnosing the disease. The molecules are known as estrogen receptors, progesterone receptors, and HER2. These molecules, although present in only a small amount of breast cancer cases, can indicate the presence of breast cancer.

However, the use of these "biomarkers" to predict breast cancer is anything but an exact science.

"The problem with these biomarkers is that many of them are present at some level in the normal breast," says Georg Weber, MD, PhD, lead investigator of the new study and associate professor of pharmacy at the University of Cincinnati in a press release published by the university. "In addition, they are surface molecules that support growth so they are not necessarily a good predictor of tumor metastasis."

Instead, Weber and his team of researchers have found another molecule, named osteopontin-c that more accurately predicts the chances of developing breast cancer that will spread to other organs and parts of the body. Osteopontin is a protein that helps cells move throughout the body. Of the three types of osteopontin, osteopontin-a is form that helps with immune system function, osteopontin-b has an unknown function, and osteopontin c seems to be present in 78 percent of cancers.

Better than osteopontin-c's high rate of presence in areas with cancer is the fact it is not found in normal tissue or organs.

"Osteopontin-c was present in a substantially higher number of breast cancers than the three biomarkers traditionally used to diagnose breast cancer," said Weber in the press release about his findings. "We also found that the cancers containing osteopontin-c correlated with a higher tumor grade, meaning they were more likely to become aggressive cancer."

Weber hopes that the new research will not only lead to better breast cancer diagnosis but also prevent unnecessary aggressive cancer treatments.

"If we know that this molecule is not present in a patient with breast cancer, it's more likely that we can treat them with conservative therapy rather than breast surgery, hormone therapy or chemotherapy because we know it's less likely to metastasize," Weber said in the press release. "On the other hand, if we know that a patient has this molecule early in their diagnosis, we can treat it more aggressively because we know their cancer is likely to become invasive."

Source:

UC Academic Health News, "Biomarker May Be an Early Predictor of Advanced Breast Cancer" University of Cincinnati