We Can Change the Course of Breast Cancer

Scientific advances in breast cancer treatment and ensuring women benefit from them

Dennis L Citrin, MB, ChB, PhD

Medical Oncologist

Cancer Treatment Centers of America® in Illinois

© 2013 Rising Tide

Advances in Breast Cancer Knowledge

• Embrace all Modalities

• Characterization of tumor sub-types

• Identification of specific cellular targets

• Many effective treatment choices available

Breast Cancer: A New Paradigm

The Old

• Surgically remove tumor

• Recommend additional drug/radiation treatment based on: – stage of disease

– (limited) biologic information

The New

• Obtain all relevant information (including genomics) before planning multi-disciplinary treatment

• Surgery is often NOT the first treatment.

An Example: Breast MRI, June 2011

An Example: Breast MRI, September 2011

What Factors Prevent Women from Benefiting from Advances in Breast Cancer Treatment?

• Patient delay

• Patient non-compliance

• Physicians slow to implement new paradigm

Delayed Diagnosis of Breast Cancer: the CTCA Experience

• 12 month period: 591 patients with breast cancer

• Retrospective review of their medical records revealed 66 (11%) patients delayed diagnosis and/or treatment for at least 6 months

• 23 patients tried to “treat” their cancer with alternative therapies only for 18 months, on average

• 43 patients denied alternative therapies, median delay 12 months

Effect of Delay on Stage of Disease

Patient Non-Compliance

• 383 patients over 3 year period with recurrent breast cancer, following treatment elsewhere for early stage disease

• 222 patients (58%) completed primary treatment

• 161 patients (42%) did not complete primary treatment

Why Do Women Delay Seeking Help or Refuse Treatment?

• Fear of cancer • Fear of cancer treatment • Denial • Lack of information • Misinformation

Welcome to Breast Cancer Deception, an eye-opening special report by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger.

This is a shocking, tell-all report that exposes the scam of today's breast cancer industry, revealing how conventional breast cancer detection and treatment programs are actually designed to ensnare women into a very harmful (but highly lucrative) system of toxic treatments that will only cause permanent damage to her health

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/Report_Breast_Cancer_Deception_0.html#ixzz2bTZHe92m

Physicians are Slow to Implement New Paradigm

An Example: Patient History

April 2013:

• 51 year old woman presented with large mass in her left breast

• Negative family history

• BRCA negative

• Biopsy confirmed high grade triple negative cancer

May 2013 :

• Had bilateral mastectomy

• Pathology: 5.4 cm cancer left breast

• One node positive

• Right breast normal

Aug 2013: came to CTCA

Conclusions

• Scientific advances have greatly increased our knowledge about breast cancer

• As a result modern treatment is much more effective and less invasive/toxic for patients

• Many thousands of women are still denying themselves, or are being denied the benefits of modern treatment

• Media can play a vital role in helping doctors communicate with and educate women in this area