Quest for the Cure: Reflections on the Evolution of Breast Cancer Treatment

This original fourteen chapter book is a brief, slightly autobiographic tale of medical oncologists, surgeons, radiation oncologists, and breast cancer patients in a well-established cancer center in Texas, who pursued the goal of cure for breast cancer. The evolution of improved outcomes in the treatment of microscopic metastatic breast cancer is also the story of the development of adjuvant chemotherapy for post-operative breast disease. The adjuvant therapy of breast cancer came about with the realization that this malignancy, when diagnosed in most patients, had spread beyond the confines of the primary cancer.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

Foreword - by Joni Rodgers

Preface

Chapter 1 - Anatomy of an Oncologist

Case Study - Janet - Highly Sensitive Measurable Metastatic Breast Cancer

Case Study - Susan - Importance of Axillary Node Involvement

Chapter 2 - Milestones along the Road to the Cure

Case Study - Sara - Liver Metastases

Chapter 3 - The Evolving Goal of Cure and Inflammatory Breast Cancer

Case Study - Martha - The Texas Challenge

Chapter 4 - Adjuvant Therapy Advances

Case Study - Joy - Stage IV NED as a Testing Ground for Adjuvant Therapy

Case Study - Carol - Metastasis to Cervical Vertebra

Case Study - Amy - Academia vs. Efficacy

Chapter 5 - Marching Forward

Case Study - Beatta - Second Guessing the System

Case Study - Lisa - The Patient of the Future

Conclusion - Where Do We Stand in the Quest for the Cure?

APPENDICES

Milestones in Adjuvant Therapy

Breast Cancer Stages

Abbreviation Glossary