Carriers of faulty genes could be offered drugs to prevent cancers

GIVING drugs usually administered in the late stages of breast cancer to healthy people with faulty genes could prevent them from developing the disease, a study has suggested.

The discovery could lead to people who are carriers of the BRCA mutation – which puts them at a higher risk of breast, ovarian and other cancers – being offered preventative treatment options other than surgery, researchers said.

It comes after academics from the University of Cambridge discovered immune cells in the breast tissue of healthy women carrying faulty BRCA1 or BRCA2 genes showed signs of a malfunction known as exhaustion.

This mechanism – usually found in late-stage tumours – suggests the immune cells cannot clear out damaged cells, which eventually leads to cancer.

Senior author Professor Walid Khaled said immunotherapy drugs exist which block this function in the late-stages of the disease.

He said: “We’re very excited about this discovery, because it opens up potential for a preventative treatment other than surgery for carriers of BRCA breast cancer gene mutations.

“Drugs already exist that can overcome this block in immune cell function but so far they’ve only been approved for late-stage disease.”

Immunotherapy helps the immune system recognise and fight cancer.

“No-one has really considered using them in a preventative way before,” Prof Khaled added. “However, these drugs do have serious side effects and we are working now on testing these in pre-clinical models to determine a safe dosage before moving to human studies.”

Out of 100 women with a BRCA1 gene mutation between 65 and 85 will develop breast cancer in their lifetime while between 40 and 63 will develop ovarian cancer.

Out of 100 women with the BRCA2 mutation, between 40 and 85 will develop breast cancer at some point in their life.

In some cases, patients with the faulty genes may be offered risk-reducing surgery, which removes tissue such as breasts or ovaries, that could become cancerous.

Cancer Research UK has granted the Cambridge research team with an award to test the method in mice.

After this, a pilot clinical trial could be carried out in women with BRCA gene mutations.