Breast cancer patients have greatly benefited from the progress in molecular oncology

  • Cancer research has become a global enterprise, and the number of researchers, as well as the cost for their activities, has skyrocketed. The budget for the National Cancer Institute of the United States National Institutes of Health alone was US$5.2 billion in 2015. Since most of the research is funded by public money, it is perfectly legitimate to ask if these large expenses are worth it. In this brief commentary, we recapitulate some of the breakthroughs that mark the history of breast cancer research over the past decades and emphasize the resulting benefits for afflicted women. In 1971, only 40% of women diagnosed with breast cancer would live another 10 years. Today, nearly 80% of women reach that significant milestone in most developed countries. This dramatic change has afforded breast cancer patients many productive years and a better quality of life. Progress resulted largely from advances in the understanding of the molecular details of the disease and their translation into innovative, rationally designed therapies. These developments are founded on the revolution in molecular and cellular biology, an entirely new array of methods and technologies, the enthusiasm, optimism, and diligence of scientists and clinicians, and the considerable funding efforts from public and private sources. We were lucky to be able to spend our productive years in a period of scientific upheaval in which methods and concepts were revolutionized and that allowed us to contribute, within the global scientific community, to the progress in basic science and clinical practice.

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Author:Bernd GronerGND, Nancy E. Hynes
URN:urn:nbn:de:hebis:30:3-419937
URL:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5042426
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.2000314
ISSN:1544-9173
ISSN:1545-7885
Pubmed Id:https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27684370
Parent Title (English):PLoS biology
Publisher:PLoS
Place of publication:Lawrence, Kan.
Document Type:Article
Language:English
Date of Publication (online):2016/09/29
Date of first Publication:2016/09/29
Publishing Institution:Universitätsbibliothek Johann Christian Senckenberg
Release Date:2016/11/10
Volume:14
Issue:(9): e2000314
Page Number:5
First Page:1
Last Page:5
Note:
Copyright: © 2016 Groner, Hynes. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
HeBIS-PPN:421457139
Institutes:Angeschlossene und kooperierende Institutionen / Georg-Speyer-Haus
Dewey Decimal Classification:6 Technik, Medizin, angewandte Wissenschaften / 61 Medizin und Gesundheit / 610 Medizin und Gesundheit
Sammlungen:Universitätspublikationen
Licence (German):License LogoCreative Commons - Namensnennung 4.0