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Hello ladies,
Can you please share your experience of testing tumor cell sensitivity to estrogen and progesterone? when did you do the test? Is it helpful for your treatment? Can it be done six months after surgury?
Thanks
rai
My tumor was tested about a year after I had my hysty. It was tested to see if the hormonal drugs would possibly work. Estrogen was 85% and progesteron was 15% so we gave the hormonals a try. They did not work but I wished they did. Two pills in the morning and two in the evening with practically zero side effects.
More likely when cancer cells are ER positive, estrogen would highten their growth and blocking that estrogen from binding may stop them from growing.
Women who are pregnant later in life are at increased risk of developing breast cancer than are women who are pregnant at a younger age. There is a protective effect that is specific for estrogen receptor positive breast cancer.
Whether this protective effect applies to ovarian cancer may depend on the role of stem cells and the interactions between stem cells and estrogen.
Thanks gpawelski.
I am just wondering if the tumor cell is ER positive, does that mean it has a higher probability to recur during pregnancy? since our body produce more ER when pregnant...
rai
Remember, ER and PR tests are valuable not because they measure expression of estrogen and progesterone but rather because they detect (and supposedly measure) the ER and PR receptors in the nucleus of the cell. The presence of positive IHC staining of such receptors in at least 10% of nuclei implies that the tumor is hormonally dependent and therefore, depriving the cells of the hormone will kill them or retards their growth. However, testing for the presence of receptors to a specific antigen only "implies" dependence upon that antigen, it doesn't actually assess the direct or indirect "effect" of the drug upon the tumor cell.
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