Breast cancer research success leads to more funding

Research that could one day lead to a new way of predicting how a patient's breast cancer will develop and would allow clinicians to tailor their treatments has been awarded funding of £153,601 by the Breast Cancer Campaign (BCC).

With the help of previous BCC funding, grant recipients Dr Ana Schor and Professor Seth Schor and their research team have already found that a breast cancer patient's prognosis could be predicted by the amount of a protein - called MSF - their tumours produce.

MSF is a protein produced in high quantities by breast tumours which helps the tumour develop its own blood supply so that it can grow and spread around the body.

The Schor team found that the higher the amount of MSF, the worse the prognosis. They have also discovered that there are two different types of MSF. One form is "active" and is found in 90 percent of breast cancer patients, while the other form is "inactive" and found in the majority of people who do not have cancer. Dr Schor will look at both forms of MSF to see what makes them different.

Dr Ana Schor said, "We hope to develop tests which will allow us to quickly assess how much and which type of MSF a breast cancer patient has. This information may allow clinicians to predict the course of the disease and therefore which treatment would be the most effective for the patient."

Pamela Goldberg, Chief Executive, Breast Cancer Campaign, said, "This pioneering research will play a major part in the future treatment of breast cancer which will be in drug regimes tailored to the individual patient."