Breast Cancer Gene Therapy - How Does it Work?

Scientists have begun to explore gene therapy as a possible candidate for breast cancer treatments. To give you a clue of what this therapy might be, it's basically the delivery of gene(s) to cancer cells in the body. Injected genes have a direct effect on changing the malign cell behaviour.

The therapeutic genes as they are called are delivered to cancerous cells via vectors (or carrier vehicles). Think of them as computer programmers, who reprogram the bad cells. They basically deliver therapeutic healthy genes to cancerous tissue. This is as close to curing the cause of the malign tumour as modern medicine can get.

However, the greatest constraint in this therapy in general and specifically for breast cancer is an optimal delivery vector. There is extensive research seeking to optimize therapeutic gene delivery to cancerous cells combined with other different available therapies. It is hoped that gene therapy will limit the toxic side effects for the patient undergoing other treatments.

Gene therapy for breast cancer definitely has a big potential, even for today. Either when used in conjunction with another or as a sole form of treatment it can already be applied today. The success rate percentage data is hard to find from good sources, but this therapy is definitely worth of your attention. Through this treatment it is possible to explicitly target cancerous cells only and attempt to kill them. Also, gene carriers will continuously travel in the blood to seek cancer cells.

Genes play a central role in the breast cancer development. Statistics show that hereditary breast cancer makes up approximately 5% to 10% of all types. Some scientists believe that gene therapy is the most effective means of treating this type of cancer and it may accomplish more desirable results than any other available treatment.