Study may open new options for younger women with breast cancer

By Julie Steenhuysen CHICAGO (Reuters) – The estrogen-blocking drug Aromasin worked better than the long-standing therapy tamoxifen at keeping cancers from returning in younger women with early stage breast cancer, a finding that may change the way the patients are treated, U.S. researchers said on Sunday. Aromasin, a drug developed by Pfizer Inc that is sold generically as exemestane, is in a class of treatments called aromatase inhibitors that are typically used in post-menopausal women with low levels of estrogen. The drugs have largely been off-limits for younger women with working ovaries that produce estrogen. In premenopausal women with hormone-sensitive cancers, the standard for preventing recurrence is five years of treatment with a drug called tamoxifen.