Experts Favor Drug Combo for Breast Cancer

Many women should consider taking a combination of chemotherapy drugs after surgery for localized breast cancer because the additional treatment improves long-term survival, a panel of experts said Friday.

Three to six months of treatment with two or more chemotherapy drugs is optimal and can benefit even women whose cancer has not spread to their lymph nodes, the panel concluded.

The panel, convened by the National Institutes of Health, also said most women whose tumors may be fueled by estrogen should receive hormonal treatment, typically by taking the drug tamoxifen for five years, not just one or two years.

The panel’s recommendations should alert doctors and patients to which therapies are state-of-the-art and which need more research on how best to use them, said committee chairwoman Patricia Eifel, a radiation oncologist at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.