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Bone Complications in Breast Cancer

Summary & Participants

When breast cancer spreads it often ends up in bone. This can cause severe pain, weaken the bones and result in fractures. Learn how these bone complications can be treated and even prevented, making life a little easier for the person with breast cancer.

Medically Reviewed On: June 30, 2008

Webcast Transcript

ANNOUNCER: Breast cancer like many cancers can sometimes spread to other parts of the body. Often the disease attacks the bone and complications occur. Doctors have effective treatments to combat this situation but why do complications occur in the first place?

LEE ROSEN, MD: There are two separate reasons why bone complications would occur in breast cancer. One is that the tumor itself can invade the bone and cause what are almost like holes in the bone. The other is that the cancer itself can cause hormonal or chemical changes that would result in bone loss and the same kinds of symptoms.

GABRIEL HORTOBAGYI, MD: Bone is a very rich depository of substances that enhance the growth of tumor cells, so it's a vicious circle if you wish, during which the tumor cell produces substances that enhance the destruction of normal bone. And the destruction of normal bone ends up in the release of substances that produce growth of cancer cells.

ANNOUNCER: For patients with breast cancer that has spread to the bone, the first symptom is usually pain.

LEE ROSEN, MD: Most of the time patients will come in with symptoms of bone pain or joint aches or something not going right, but routinely we have a way of monitoring for these side effects. We can check people's blood counts. We can use different radiographic examinations like bone scans or CAT scans and make the diagnosis that way.

ANNOUNCER: Breast cancer cells reach the bone through the blood stream. Once there, these cancerous cells can make the disease even more difficult for the patient.

GABRIEL HORTOBAGYI, MD: They can produce a number of complications that include first of all, pain. Second, fractures in areas that are weakened by the destruction of normal bone components. Third, they can release massive amounts of calcium, which complicate our ability to maintain a balance within our blood stream, and can cause in its most extreme form, death. And they can produce other complications that are less common such as compression of the spinal cord.

LEE ROSEN, MD: The bone complications can severely affect people's quality of life. Obviously if someone is in severe pain, or they've had a fracture and they're not able to move in the same way, their lives can be severely affected.

ANNOUNCER: But there are effective treatments available for breast cancer patients with bone complications. Pain medications, radiation therapy and even surgery have proven successful. As have a class of drugs called bisphosphonates.

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