Breast cancer hope from vitamin A

BRUSSELS - A drug based on a derivative of vitamin A may help to prevent high-risk young women from developing breast cancer.

A study presented at the Second European Breast Cancer Conference showed that the vitamin A derivative, called fenretinide, prevented a second tumour developing in young women with early breast cancer.

"The results suggest that when fenretinide is used against a background of circulating oestrogen, as there is in premenopausal women, it has potential to prevent the disease," said Dr Alberto Costa, of the European Institute of Oncology.

"This drug could make a major impact, both as a treatment and as a primary preventive of breast cancer in younger women and, what is also important, it appears to be well tolerated."

Dr Costa and colleagues tested the compound on 3000 women with early breast cancer. Half were given fenretinide after surgery for five years and the other half received no further treatment.

When followed up, the women eight years after the initial treatment, they discovered that only 27 younger women who had taken the compound developed a second cancer in the healthy breast and 58 in the same breast, compared with 42 and 87 in the untreated group.

But when the scientists checked the results of women who were past menopause the opposite occurred. Women who had not taken the derivative had fewer secondary cancers than those who did.

Dr Costa said two other studies were progress. One is testing the compound combined with a low dose of the anti-cancer drug tamoxifen and the other is studying the effects of fenretinide plus hormone replacement therapy in older women.

Women whose breast cancer is caught in the earliest stages have the best chance of beating the disease but about one in 100 each year develop a cancer in the healthy breast and two or three will have a second cancer in the same breast, according to the researchers.

More than 250 papers will be presented at the conference highlighting the latest research and treatments for the disease.

- REUTERS