Breast cancer patients benefit from bone drug [Updated]

Breast cancer patients who take drugs called aromatase inhibitors can experience a decline in bone density. However, a new study shows that adding an osteoporosis drug to their medication regimen prevents the bone loss.

Aromatase inhibitors halt estrogen production in postmenopausal women, which is good for stopping the growth of cancer cells. But the loss of estrogen harms bone health and these patients are at higher risk for bone loss and fractures. In the new study, from the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute, women taking aromatase inhibitors were either prescribed the osteoporosis drug zoledronic acid (also known as Zometa) concurrently with cancer therapy or only after bone loss or a fracture occurred.

The study, published online Monday in the journal Cancer, found that the women who toke zoledronic acid concurrently had significant increases in bone density. But those who took the medication only after a bone problem arose had steady declines in bone mass.

Although giving zoledronic acid simultaneously with aromatase inhibitors builds bone health and is the “preferred treatment,” according to the authors, even the women who received it later benefited from the osteoporosis medication and were able to reverse their bone loss.

In addition to being approved for osteoporosis, zoledronic acid is approved to treat the bone complications of cancer.

[For the record: An earlier version of this post referred to the brand name of zoledronic acid as Reclast. But the version used for bone density related to cancer treatment is known as Zometa.]

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