A cluster of breast cancer cells undergoing programmed cell deathWELLCOME IMAGES, ANNIE CAVANAGH
Breast cancers may become resistant to standard hormone therapy because the estrogen receptor becomes reprogrammed to bind to different spots in the genome, according to a study publishing today (January 4) in Nature. The findings could provide clues for developing therapies to overcome resistance or diagnostics that could predict which patients are more likely to be resistant to hormone therapy.
“They have shown the pattern of binding is different between different types of tumors,” said medical endocrinologist Karin Dahlman-Wright of the Karolinska Institute in Sweden, who was not involved in the study. “If we could change the pattern of binding, we could maybe make the tumors responsive to the endocrine therapy.”
Roughly three-quarters of breast cancers require an estrogen receptor to grow. The receptor is ...
