MADISON -- University of Wisconsin researchers are testing a new drug that may help breast cancer and Lou Gehrig's patients -- tamoxifen.
While treating a woman with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a UW doctor found the patient's muscle strength stabilized. He knew she was taking tamoxifen for breast cancer.
"An experiment that is good scientifically is one that gives you information that you didn't expect," said Dr. Benjamin Brooks, UW neurologist.
The theory has been tested on animals, but now Brooks will begin using tamoxifen for those battling Lou Gehrig's disease (ALS).
"If the animal work is supported by the human work then what's going to happen is that people are going to be looking in this pathway as a way to understand what's going on with ALS," Brooks said.
Lou Gehrig's disease slowly attacks a victim's brain, limiting the ability to control muscle movement. Irene Panodocchi was diagnosed a year ago with ALS.
She is taking part in a study on tamoxifen and how the drug may slow the advance of her disease.
"If it helps someone else, it will be good," Panodocchi said.
Women who have been diagnosed with breast cancer and those at high risk for it have been taking tamoxifen for the study also.
Brooks will present his findings Tuesday in San Diego at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience.
The Journal of the American Medical Association Report
The Journal of the American Medical Association reported this week that tamoxifen reduces the incidence of breast cancer in healthy women who carry BRCA2 gene mutations that predispose them to the disease, but does not reduce breast cancer incidence in healthy women with predisposing mutations in the BRCA1 gene.
Tamoxifen works by targeting estrogen receptors in breast tissue (tissue with the receptor is termed ER-positive). Certain precancerous changes in the breast, however, may cause loss of the ER, rendering these tissues ER-negative.
The ER status is different in women with BRCA2 mutations compared with women with BRCA1 mutations. In the BCPT study, tamoxifen reduced the incidence of ER-positive tumors, but did not reduce the incidence of ER-negative tumors.
The JAMA study addressed the incidence of new breast cancer cases among healthy women with BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutations, not the treatment of existing breast cancer. Among women with breast cancer that is ER-positive, tamoxifen has been shown by other studies to reduce the risk of recurrence of the disease, regardless of the BRCA1 or BRCA2 genotype of the patient.
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