Melbourne researchers have developed an
antibody
designed to prevent the spread of breast cancer
to
bones, offering hope of improved survival rates from
a
disease that kills 2000 Australian women a
year.
Trials of the antibody are due to begin in the
United
States and Japan later this
year.
If successful, the trials could lead to women who
are
diagnosed with breast cancer routinely
receiving
pre-emptive treatment to stop the disease spreading
to
their
bones.
Seventy per cent of breast cancers that are
left
untreated invade bone tissue, causing the bones
to
dissolve and even break, according to Dr
Matthew
Gillespie, an associate director at the St
Vincent's
Institute of Medical
Research.
He said that once breast cancers formed tumors
in
bone, they significantly reduced a patient's chances
of
survival. If the antibody trials succeeded, he said
breast
cancer patients could in future expect to live
longer.
Dr Gillespie said researchers at the institute had
spent
about 10 years trying to work out how and why
breast
cancer cells can grow in
bone.
In October they published a paper in the
journal
Endocrinology outlining how breast cancers
invaded
bone and formed
tumors.
The paper, co-written by researchers from
the
University of Melbourne's department of medicine
and
the University of Texas Health Science
Centre,
contradicted previous research suggesting
breast
cancers were directly responsible for degrading
bone.
Rather, the new research showed that a
protein
produced by breast cancers - PTHrP - was the
source
of the
problem.
The St Vincent's research team
subsequently
developed the antibody with the aim of stopping
the
protein from activating bone-degrading
cells.
The antibody has already been successfully tested
on
rodents. A Japanese company, the
Chugai
Pharmaceutical Company, has adapted the antibody
for
use in
humans.
