Breast cancer drug found effective nearly six years after treatment

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Drugs like anastrozole are taken to prevent breast cancer’s return. File Photo by CristinaMuraca/Shutterstock

(UPI HealthDay News) – Nearly six years after stopping a five-year regimen of the breast cancer drug anastrozole, women at high risk for breast cancer were 50 percent less likely to have been struck by the disease, new research shows.

The trial included more than 3,800 postmenopausal women at high risk for breast cancer. They were deemed to be at high risk for a variety of reasons, including having two or more blood relatives with breast cancer, having a mother or sister who developed breast cancer before age 50, and having a mother or sister who had breast cancer in both breasts.

About half of the participants were randomly selected to take the aromatase inhibitor drug anastrozole — Arimidex — for five years and about half took a placebo.

As one breast cancer expert unconnected to the study explained, drugs like anastrozole are taken to prevent breast cancer’s return. (…)

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