Over dinner a few nights ago, a friend in my book club asked me how my radiation treatments were going. I told her, “So far, so good.” She volunteered that, one day, what is currently the standard of care for cancers of all types will seem arcane.

As my friend is a microbiologist running her own firm, I asked what she thought future therapies for cancer might be like. “Maybe a regimen of pills and shots,” she volunteered.

We both agreed that a vaccine would be nice. However, as the causes of cancer--especially breast cancer--still seem a mystery, a vaccine will be difficult to develop. One can dream.

In Dr. Susan Love’s Breast Book I found this tantalizing mention of vaccination: “We have always dreamed of finding something distinctive about the cancer cell and developing a therapy specific to it. We would then give the antibody, kill or control all of the cancer cells, and do little or no harm to the rest of the body.”*

In a section of the book called, What Is Coming, Dr. Love describes ongoing research. She says promising new findings are “already in the pipeline. It’s not fantasy; it’s a question of how soon we’ll know what to do with our knowledge.”

What she wrote next really surprised me: “In the future breast cancer may be as treatable as high blood pressure and diabetes are today. These diseases can be effectively treated by controlling the symptoms with medication without totally eliminating the underlying disease. The rehabilitation of the cancer cell may be an effective treatment so that the patient, while still having cancer, will be alive and well.”

“Even better,” Dr. Love goes on, “we will be able to stop breast cancer at its source--destroy the cells lining the milk ducts where all breast cancer starts. In this way, we will be able to prevent it all together.”

As Dr. Love notes in the dedication of her book, “We are working hard toward the day when our daughters and nieces will never have to hear the words ‘you have breast cancer.’”

Wouldn’t that be just fantastic?


*Dr. Susan Love's internet site: http://www.dslrf.org/breastcancer/