scholarly journals Cancer Vaccines, Treatment of the Future: With Emphasis on HER2-Positive Breast Cancer

2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 779
Author(s):  
Sandeep Pallerla ◽  
Ata ur Rahman Mohammed Abdul ◽  
Jill Comeau ◽  
Seetharama Jois

Breast cancer is one of the leading causes of death in women. With improvements in early-stage diagnosis and targeted therapies, there has been an improvement in the overall survival rate in breast cancer over the past decade. Despite the development of targeted therapies, tyrosine kinase inhibitors, as well as monoclonal antibodies and their toxin conjugates, all metastatic tumors develop resistance, and nearly one-third of HER2+ breast cancer patients develop resistance to all these therapies. Although antibody therapy has shown promising results in breast cancer patients, passive immunotherapy approaches have limitations and need continuous administration over a long period. Vaccine therapy introduces antigens that act on cancer cells causing prolonged activation of the immune system. In particular, cancer relapse could be avoided due to the presence of a longer period of immunological memory with an effective vaccine that can protect against various tumor antigens. Cancer vaccines are broadly classified as preventive and therapeutic. Preventive vaccines are used to ward off any future infections and therapeutic vaccines are used to treat a person with active disease. In this article, we provided details about the tumor environment, different types of vaccines, their advantages and disadvantages, and the current status of various vaccine candidates with a focus on vaccines for breast cancer. Current data indicate that therapeutic vaccines themselves have limitations in terms of efficacy and are used in combination with other chemotherapeutic or targeting agents. The majority of breast cancer vaccines are undergoing clinical trials and the next decade will see the fruitfulness of breast cancer vaccine therapy.

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Paulo Luz ◽  
Elsa Campoa ◽  
Rita Gameiro ◽  
Marta Vaz ◽  
Isabel Fernandes ◽  
...  

Over the last years, the incidence of brain metastases in HER2 breast cancer patients has increased. Surgery and radiotherapy are the current standard local therapies. Nevertheless, it is unclear which and when systemic treatment should be applied in addition to local treatment. This work aims to present an updated review of current systemic treatment options for patients with HER2+ metastatic breast cancer with brain metastases and to present a case study of clinical cases that occurred in a Portuguese population. The methodology of this work included a literature search in PubMed for the impact of HER2-targeting agents, such as pertuzumab, trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1), lapatinib, neratinib, trastuzumab deruxtecan, and tucatinib in the treatment of patients with HER2+ breast cancer with brain metastases. Then, a cohort of Portuguese patients with HER2+ breast cancer (n=44) was analyzed. In this exploratory study, considering a follow-up of 23.9 months, three patients (6.8%) developed brain metastases despite having shown a complete pathological response. The role of systemic treatment for patients with HER2 breast cancer with brain metastases has rapidly evolved following recent successes in phase II and III clinical trials. The biggest challenge is how to integrate systemic and local treatment in the management of these patients.


2021 ◽  
Vol 32 ◽  
pp. S58
Author(s):  
T. Monier ◽  
A. Samir ◽  
A.A. El Khodiry ◽  
R. Abdel Tawab ◽  
H.M. El Tayebi

Cancers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 771
Author(s):  
Tessa A. M. Mulder ◽  
Mirjam de With ◽  
Marzia del Re ◽  
Romano Danesi ◽  
Ron H. J. Mathijssen ◽  
...  

Tamoxifen is a major option for adjuvant endocrine treatment in estrogen receptor (ER) positive breast cancer patients. The conversion of the prodrug tamoxifen into the most active metabolite endoxifen is mainly catalyzed by the enzyme cytochrome P450 2D6 (CYP2D6). Genetic variation in the CYP2D6 gene leads to altered enzyme activity, which influences endoxifen formation and thereby potentially therapy outcome. The association between genetically compromised CYP2D6 activity and low endoxifen plasma concentrations is generally accepted, and it was shown that tamoxifen dose increments in compromised patients resulted in higher endoxifen concentrations. However, the correlation between CYP2D6 genotype and clinical outcome is still under debate. This has led to genotype-based tamoxifen dosing recommendations by the Clinical Pharmacogenetic Implementation Consortium (CPIC) in 2018, whereas in 2019, the European Society of Medical Oncology (ESMO) discouraged the use of CYP2D6 genotyping in clinical practice for tamoxifen therapy. This paper describes the latest developments on CYP2D6 genotyping in relation to endoxifen plasma concentrations and tamoxifen-related clinical outcome. Therefore, we focused on Pharmacogenetic publications from 2018 (CPIC publication) to 2021 in order to shed a light on the current status of this debate.


The Breast ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 56 ◽  
pp. S62-S63
Author(s):  
G. Nogueira-Costa ◽  
J. Gramaça ◽  
I. Fernandes ◽  
C. Trabulo ◽  
J. Gonçalves ◽  
...  

2021 ◽  
Vol 39 (15_suppl) ◽  
pp. e12533-e12533
Author(s):  
Constantinos Savva ◽  
Charles N Birts ◽  
Stéphanie A Laversin ◽  
Alicia Lefas ◽  
Jamie Krishnan ◽  
...  

e12533 Background: Obesity is associated with breast cancer development and worse survival. Obesity can initiate, promote, and maintain systemic inflammation via metabolic reprogramming of macrophages that encircle adipocytes, termed crown-like structures (CLS). In breast cancer patients, CLS are present in 36-50% of patients and have been associated with anthropometric parameters. Here we focus on HER2+ breast cancer. The role of adiposity in HER2+ breast cancer is conflicting which may be attributed to the tumour heterogeneity. Adiposity has also been shown to affect the local immune environment of solid tumours. However, the prognostic significance of CLS in HER2+ breast cancer is still unknown. Methods: We investigated the prognostic significance of CLS in a cohort of 219 patients with primary HER2+ breast cancer who were diagnosed between 1982 to 2012 in Southampton General Hospital. This cohort includes 76 HER2+ trastuzumab naïve patients and 143 HER2+ patients treated with adjuvant trastuzumab. We stained FFPE tumour samples for the expression of CD68, CD16 and CD32B on CLS and correlated these to clinical outcomes. CLS were defined as CLS within distant adipose tissue, CLS within the adipose-tumour border (B-CLS) and intratumoural CLS. CLS were quantified manually in full face sections by two independent scorers and descriptive and Cox regression analysis was carried out. Results: A total of 201 tumours were suitable for CLS analyses. The median follow-up was 34.74 months (range, 0.43-299.08). In the trastuzumab naive cohort, B-CLS≤1 and B-CLS > 1 were present in 37 (52.11%) and 34 (47.89%), respectively. In the trastuzumab treated cohort, B-CLS≤1 were identified in 69 (53.08%) and B-CLS > 1 were found in 61 (46.92%) of the tumours. CLS were more commonly found in the adipose-tumour border (60.89%) rather than in the distant adipose tissue (36.14%) or intratumorally (14.36%). The presence of any CLS was significantly associated with BMI≥25 kg/m2 (p = 0.018). There was strong evidence of association between CD68+CD32B+ B-CLS and BMI≥25 kg/m2 (p = 0.007). Co-expression of CD16 and CD32B by B-CLS was more frequent in patients with BMI≥25 kg/m2 (p = 0.036). Survival analysis showed shorter time to metastatic disease in patients with CD68+ B-CLS > 1 (p = 0.011) in the trastuzumab treated cohort. Subgroup analysis revealed that in the BMI≥25 kg/m2 group, patients with CD68+ B-CLS > 1 had shorter time to metastatic disease compared to patients with B-CLS≤1 (p = 0.004). Multivariate cox regression showed that B-CLS > 1 is an independent prognostic factor for shorter time to metastatic disease in patients with primary HER2+ breast cancer that received adjuvant trastuzumab (HR 6.81, 95%CI (1.38-33.54), p = 0.018). Conclusions: B-CLS can be potentially used as a predictive biomarker to optimize the stratification and personalisation of treatment in HER2-overexpressed breast cancer patients.


2002 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 1128-1143 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rowan T. Chlebowski ◽  
Erin Aiello ◽  
Anne McTiernan

PURPOSE: To systematically review and summarize evidence relevant to obesity and breast cancer clinical outcome, potential hormonal mediating mechanisms, and the current status of weight loss interventions for chronic disease management. METHODS: A comprehensive, formal literature review was conducted to identify 5,687 citations with key information from 159 references summarized in text and tables. This process included a search for all breast cancer studies exploring associations among survival or recurrence and obesity at diagnosis or weight gain after diagnosis using prospective criteria. RESULTS: On the basis of observational studies, women with breast cancer who are overweight or gain weight after diagnosis are found to be at greater risk for breast cancer recurrence and death compared with lighter women. Obesity is also associated with hormonal profiles likely to stimulate breast cancer growth. Recently, use of weight loss algorithms proven successful in other clinical settings that incorporate dietary therapy, physical activity, and ongoing behavior therapy have been endorsed by the National Institutes of Health and other health agencies. CONCLUSION: Although definitive weight loss intervention trials in breast cancer patients remain to be conducted, the current evidence relating increased body weight to adverse breast cancer outcome and the documented favorable effects of weight loss on clinical outcome in other comorbid conditions support consideration of programs for weight loss in breast cancer patients. Recommendations for the clinical care of overweight or obese breast cancer patients are offered.


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