Fewer but bigger treatments best for breast cancer

Alison Motluk

Where radiation and breast cancer are concerned, less may be better. That's according to two studies involving thousands of women followed for half a decade. The women were given fewer doses -- but stronger ones.

Radiation therapy is a fine art. Doctors need to administer enough to eradicate the cancer, but in sufficiently small doses that normal healthy tissue isn't compromised. The current internationally accepted standard for treating early breast cancer is to give 50 Gray of radiation in 25 separate "fractions", of 2 Gray each, over five weeks.

The two new studies challenge that. In one, dubbed START A, John Yarnold at the Institute of Cancer Research in Sutton, UK and colleagues recruited 2236 women with early breast cancer from 17 centres around the UK.

source and complete article: New Scientist