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Research buoys cancer detection, treatment

Detection, treatment of breast cancer has come a long way

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By Ben Sutherly, Staff Writer Updated 4:15 PM Sunday, September 26, 2010

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. This article is part of our month-long focus on breast cancer. To learn more or find ways to help, go to our Pink Edition Page.

DAYTON — While undergoing radiation treatment for breast cancer at Miami Valley Hospital, Kathy Steyer has had a multi-lumen balloon temporarily implanted where her tumor was removed.

Thanks to the balloon, which has hollow channels dispersed throughout, “we can customize the dose distribution (in the breast) better to spare the skin and the rib cage” from radiation exposure, said Dr. Rebecca Paessun, a radiation oncologist with Dayton Physicians LLC.

In use since April, it’s one of Miami Valley’s latest advances in treating breast cancer.

“Six months ago, I wouldn’t have been able to have this done” at the hospital, said Steyer, 62, of Greenville.

Strides in breast cancer detection and treatment have had profound consequences. In the early 1960s, 63 percent of women could expect to survive five years past diagnosis, the American Cancer Society reports. Now it’s 89 percent.

Those advances came from research. The National Institutes of Health spent $726 million in fiscal 2008 alone. Meanwhile, the American Cancer Society is devoting $119 million to 223 research grants on breast cancer.

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