Desk of the Editor

Changing Trend in Breast Cancer

There is a changing trend in the management of various malignant diseases from conventional therapy to the target therapy resulting in personalized medicine to precisition therapy. This fits in to the present day thinking on breast cancer from early, to metastatic breast cancer, one size does not fit all.

The month of October is known for “Breast cancer awareness” programme. In this country, this year a new vista is opened on ‘June 21’ celebrating “International Yoga” day bring in harmony, health for all by popularizing Yoga techniques. We also looked at how one can utilize one of the ancient forms of Indian medicine in Breast cancer. The concept of CAM is captualised along with conventional treatment.

The understanding of disease, body, mind a perplexing combination where stress acts through “Spiritual hypo thalamus pituitary axis’, bringing in changes of psycho neuro immunological parameters..

Dr.R.M.Rao et al. in their letters to the editor highlighted that Integrating Yoga in Oncology: Is the wait over? Highlighting quality of life is given prime importance in treatment decision making. The evolving concept of ‘CAM’ therapies has brought in the concept of modern medicine with the ‘evident’ based natural complementary therapies. Dr. Chintamani has focused on Indian solution to universal problem for holistic cancer care. The use of complementary therapy and alternative therapies used patients magnificently exceeds that of general population.

There is changing trends in management of Breast cancer and a review by Ismai Jatoi et al. suggesting the future concept of unilateral disease with Bilateral mastectomy. The contra lateral Breast Management is also reviewed. The utility of PET – CT in breast cancer are documented a review by Dev et al. and Narendra et al. Management of axilla in 2015 is well documented. The emerging role of trend of obesity and cancer treatment needs a relook.

“The breast cancer needs more understanding of Biology and Human mind”.

Breast cancer is a profoundly stressful disease posing both physical and psychological threats to the patient. Patients have to endure distressing side effects of multimodal treatments over a long period of time leading to anxiety, depression and other psychological reactions that can affect treatment compliance.

As patients live longer with cancer, concern is growing about both the health-related quality of life of those diagnosed with cancer and the quality of care they receive. Primary care providers, specialists, other health care providers, patients, and families all have an important role in symptom management throughout the course of cancer. Therefore, using interventions that help alleviate distressful symptoms and improve quality of life as an add-on to conventional treatments are recommended as a cohesive strategy to mitigate this problem.

Bibliography:

• 1. Influence of yoga on mood states, distress, quality of life and immune outcomes in early stage breast cancer patients undergoing surgery

Raghavendra M Rao, H R Nagendra, Nagarathna Raghuram, C Vinay, S Chandrashekara,¹ K S Gopinath,² and B S Srinath²

Int J Yoga. 2008 Jan-Jun; 1(1): 11–20. doi: 10.4103/0973-6131.36789: PMCID: PMC3144603

• 2. Chintamani, Gogne A, Khandelwal R, Tandon M, Jain S, Kumar Y, Narayan N, Bamal R, Srinivas S, Saxena S (2011) The correlation of anxiety and depression levels with response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy in patients with breast cancer. JRSM Short Rep 2(3):15

• 3. Adherence to yoga practice improves symptom control and quality of life in breast cancer patients undergoing conventional treatment.

J Clin Oncol 30, 2012 (suppl; abstr e11511)

Author(s): Rao M. Raghavendra, Kodaganur Srinivasachar Gopinath, B S Srinath, Shekhar Patil, P Shashidhara, Ravi B Diwakar, Ramesh Bilimagga S, Nalini K Rao, Basavalinga S. Ajaikumar, Jayanna Prashanth, K N Chidambaramurthy; HCG Bangalore Institute of Oncology, Bangalore, India; Triesta Sciences, Bangalore, India

Dr.K.S.Gopinath

M.S.,F.R.C.S., F.A.M.S.

Editor - IJSO