New Approaches to Women’s Health

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October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month and Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month. Check here for a brief roundup of the latest women’s health news.

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Breast Cancer Trial Data Now Published

• Initial results were announced from the Trial Assigning IndividuaLized Options for Treatment (Rx), or TAILORx, a multicenter prospectively conducted trial of more than 10,000 women with early stage breast cancer.

• Participants with low 21-gene recurrence score (Oncotype DX® Recurrence Score®) results of 10 or less who received hormonal therapy alone without chemotherapy had less than a 1% chance of distant recurrence at 5 years.

•Second primary cancers exceeded recurrences of the original breast cancer, resulting in 93.8% 5-year disease-free survival, the primary trial end point.

•The finding provides evidence that in the future other women may effectively use hormonal therapy alone if the Recurrence Score is 10 or less.

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Later Heart Disease Death Risk With Pregnancy Complications

• Women who experience complications during pregnancy may be at greater risk for dying from heart disease later in life than women who have uncomplicated pregnancies.

• Researchers confirmed several pregnancy complications associated with cardiovascular disease (CVD) reported in other studies.

• They also found that preeclampsia in early pregnancy strongly predicts premature CVD death before age 60 years.

• CVD death risk also increased significantly for combinations of pregnancy events.

• Researchers identified 2 new pregnancy complications that predispose women to CVD death: glycosuria and hemoglobin decline.

• And they reported an unexpected result: high blood pressure that developed after 20 weeks of pregnancy was associated with CVD only in African-American women.

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Women-Centered Noncommunicable Disease Prevention Campaign

• The United Nations’ new Sustainability Development Goals must enable the prevention, control, and management of noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) for women and girls to reach their full potential, global health leaders declared.

• Experts will discuss practical and cost-effective ways to integrate NCDs into existing health systems and programs at an event organized by the Taskforce on Women and Non-Communicable Diseases and the American Heart Association.

• The Taskforce will issue to countries the following 3 calls to action: (1) improve access to NCD treatment and care, (2) strengthen health systems, and (3) initiate and sustain women-centered NCD prevention programs and policies.

• NCDs, which predominately include cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, cancers, and chronic lung disease, represent the defining global health crisis of our generation, it was suggested.