Breast cancer prevention study launched for women with increased risk

Many women worry about their risk of breast cancer and wonder what they can do to lower their risk. For women with known risk factors for breast cancer, the anxiety is even more intense.

Now, women at increased risk may be eligible to participate in a new breast cancer prevention study offered at the Health Center’s Carole and Ray Neag Comprehensive Cancer Center.

The ExCel research study is an international study aimed at discovering whether a certain treatment can help prevent breast cancer. The medication is from a class of drugs, aromatase inhibitors, that suppresses estrogen production. Aromatase inhibitors are already approved to treat advanced breast cancer in postmenopausal women.

“This study is looking at a medication that is already approved to treat breast cancer and may have fewer side effects than our existing prevention drugs,” says Dr. Molly Brewer, director of women’s cancer prevention programs and the Division of Gynecologic Oncology.

The ExCel study will last five years and is expected to follow more than 4,500 postmenopausal women from the United States, Canada, and Spain.

To be eligible, women must be 35 years of age or older and have an increased risk of developing breast cancer. Participants will receive either the study drug or a placebo.

According to the American Cancer Society and the Neag Comprehensive Cancer Center, risk factors for breast cancer include:

• Gender – simply being female increases the risk of breast cancer;
• Age – the incidence of breast cancer increases with age;
• Genetic risk factors – such as the inherited BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutations;