Radiation therapy represents a common breast cancer treatment. During radiation therapy, doctors aim a high dose of radiation into the breast tumor, allowing the radiation to severely damage the cancer cells and promote cancer cell death. Although radiation often proves an effective method of cancer treatment, more aggressive forms of breast cancer may require additional treatment to target and kill remaining breast cancer cells. Patients with aggressive breast cancer have a number of treatment options following radiation therapy.
Hormonal Treatments
One possible course of treatment for some forms of breast cancer after radiation is hormonal therapy. In some cases, breast cancer cells respond to estrogen in the body and proliferate, so exposure to estrogen promotes breast cancer growth. These cancers are considered hormonally-responsive cancers, and may respond to hormone-based therapy. Hormonal therapies for breast cancer aim to prevent breast cancer cells from detecting estrogen in the body, or they work to prevent the formation of estrogen in the first place, lowering overall estrogen levels in the body. Patients looking to receive hormone therapy must first undergo medical testing to determine whether their cancer is estrogen-responsive and whether the cancer cells contain hormone receptors. Hormone therapy is not an effective treatment for breast cancer patients with hormone receptor-negative cancer, according to BreastCancer.org.
Antibody-Based Therapies
Another common type of treatment following radiation is antibody-based breast cancer therapy. Antibody drugs posses the ability to bind to specific factors found specifically on the surface of cancer cells. Once the antibody binds to the surface of the cell, it triggers the immune system to engulf and destroy the cancer. As a result, administering antibody-based breast cancer therapy following radiation allows the body to locate and destroy any cells that survived radiation treatment. One common antibody-based therapy for breast cancer is Herceptin, a drug that targets a protein called HER2, which is found in high amounts on some cancer cells. Patients with HER2-positive breast cancer often respond well to Herceptin treatment, according to Genentech, the drug's manufacturer.
Chemotherapy
Another possible treatment for breast cancer patients following radiation is chemotherapy. Breast cancer chemotherapy involves administering toxic drugs alone or in combination with other therapies. Chemotherapy drugs work by damaging the cell's structure or preventing essential cellular processes. In the presence of the drug, the cell cannot perform the functions required to survive; it stops proliferating and eventually dies. Breast cancer chemotherapy may allow doctors to target any kill cells remaining after radiation therapy, or may provide an effective treatment for breast cancer recurrence after radiation treatment. Breast cancer patients receiving chemotherapy may suffer from a number side effects during treatment, including anemia, abnormal bleeding and bruising, and the development of mouth sores, according to CancerHelp UK.
