A Clinical Trial Extended the Life of Women With Hard-to-Treat Breast Cancer

(HealthDay News) — An experimental hormone therapy pill has shown promise in extending the lives of women with tough-to-treat advanced breast cancer, a new clinical trial shows. The drug, imlunestrant, improved progression-free survival in patients whose breast cancer was driven by the female hormone estrogen. The drug was particularly effective in breast cancers with a mutation in the ESR1 gene, which encodes estrogen receptors, according to results published Dec. 11 in the New England Journal of Medicine. Researchers also presented the findings simultaneously at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. Individuals with hormone receptor-positive (HR+) breast cancer are most affected by mutations in the ESR1 gene. These mutations can lead to resistance to hormone therapy, a common treatment for HR+ breast cancer. While white women have the highest incidence of breast cancer overall, Black women are disproportionately affected by more aggressive forms of breast cancer, including HR+ breast cancer. “These promising results mean that imlunestrant is potentially another single-agent option for the many patients whose recurrent breast cancers harbor ESR1 mutations,” said researcher Dr. Komal Jhaveri, section head of the Endocrine Therapy Research Group at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City. Imlunestrant is a selective estrogen receptor...