Women quit cancer drug over ‘side effects’

THOUSANDS of women are giving up pills that prevent breast cancer in the mistaken belief it is causing debilitating side effects, researchers have warned.

Tamoxifen is offered to women who have either had the disease or are at a high risk of it because of their family history.

The pills can cut the risk of breast cancer occurring by 30 per cent and are prescribed for five years at a time.

But it was found patients were wrongly interpreting symptoms of the menopause as being related to the drug. A study of almost 4,000 women led by Queen Mary, University of London found that around a third of them stopped taking the pills before the recommended time.

This included 12 per cent who gave up within 18 months, mostly because they believed they were suffering side effects.

The research also studied women who took dummy pills, and found they also experienced the same side effects as those on Tamoxifen, including hot flushes, nausea, sickness and some gynaecological symptoms – all signs of menopause.

Around one in eight women will develop breast cancer during their life, and experts believe Tamoxifen and similar drugs have the potential to prevent many new cases of the disease.

There are no figures for the number of women taking the drugs but almost 700,000 prescriptions were written for it last year.

Dr Ivana Sestak, from Queen Mary University, said the symptoms reported were largely similar for women taking dummy pills or Tamoxifen.

She said: ‘This suggests that women may be attributing normally occurring agerelated symptoms, such as those experienced around the time of menopause, to their medication instead.’

She urged doctors to advise women that some symptoms they encounter could be unrelated to prescribed drugs, particularly if they are expected to experience the menopause during therapy.