BRISBANE, Australia, Oct. 31 (UPI) -- It may not matter whether women with early breast cancer get follow-up chemotherapy before, after or during radiation therapy, says an Australian study.
A woman's chances of survival or seeing the cancer return are similar in all three cases, if radiation therapy and chemotherapy begin within seven months after surgery, the review concludes.
However, the studies suggest that certain toxic side effects in the blood and esophagus -- common in chemotherapy and radiation patients -- may be up to 44 percent more likely when the two therapies are delivered at the same time, according to Dr. Brigid Hickey and colleagues at the Southern Zone Radiation Oncology Service in Brisbane.
The reviewers also note that most of the women in the studies were treated about 10 years ago. "As a result, the trials do not assess the modern types of radiotherapy and newer types of chemotherapy" and other anti-cancer drugs such as Herceptin, Hickey said. "However, the best sequence of administering these two types of therapy for early stage breast cancer is not clear."
The findings appear in The Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews.
