Tamoxifen-resistant Breast Cancer: Causes of resistance and Possible Management

Ahmed M. Kabel^{1, 2,} , Dania Altalhi³, Hanan Alsharabi³, Ola Qadi³ and Maram Ad khan³

¹Department of Clinical Pharmacy, College of Pharmacy, Taif University, Taif, KSA

²Department of Pharmacology, Faculty of Medicine, Tanta University, Tanta, Egypt

³Fifth year student, College of Pharmacy, Taif University, Taif, KSA

Cite this paper:
Ahmed M. Kabel, Dania Altalhi, Hanan Alsharabi, Ola Qadi and Maram Ad khan. Tamoxifen-resistant Breast Cancer: Causes of resistance and Possible Management. Journal of Cancer Research and Treatment. 2016; 4(3):37-40. doi: 10.12691/jcrt-4-3-1

Abstract

Tamoxifen has been used for the systemic treatment of patients with breast cancer by block the action of estrogen is also used to lower a woman's chance of developing breast cancer if she has a high risk . Treatment success is primarily dependent on the presence of the estrogen receptor (ER) in the breast carcinoma. While about half of patients with advanced ER-positive disease immediately fail to respond to tamoxifen, in the responding patients the disease ultimately progresses to a resistant phenotype. The possible causes for intrinsic and acquired resistance have been attributed to the pharmacology of tamoxifen, alterations in the structure and function of the ER and the interactions with the tumor environment and genetic alterations in the tumor cells.

Keywords:
tamoxifen; resistance; breast; cancer

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

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