AstraZeneca pill reduces breast cancer progression risk by 56%

Treating breast cancer patients with AstraZeneca’s experimental pill camizestrant at the first sign of resistance to standard therapies cut the risk of disease progression or death by half, Reuters writes, citing experts.

The results, presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting in Chicago, mark the first use of a blood test called a liquid biopsy.

The early switch approach in women with hormone receptor-positive, HER2-negative breast cancer resulted in a 56% reduction in the risk of disease progression or death, said Dr. Eleonora Teplinsky, an oncologist at Valley-Mount Sinai Comprehensive Cancer Care and an ASCO breast cancer expert.

The trial involved 3,256 patients with advanced hormone receptor-positive, HER2-negative breast cancer, the most common type in which hormones such as estrogen fuel cancer growth.

Camizestrant and similar drugs called selective estrogen receptor degraders, or SERDS, block estrogen receptor signaling in cancer cells.

Camizestrant is not yet FDA-approved, but Dr. Eleonora Teplinsky, an oncologist at Valley-Mount Sinai Comprehensive Cancer Care and an ASCO breast cancer expert, said she believes the data will likely result in a new treatment paradigm.