Elderly women with breast cancer whose surgeons refer them to cancer specialists are twice as likely to be prescribed tamoxifen, a treatment recommended for preventing recurrence of the disease, a new study shows as reported by Reuters. "Older women should be given the opportunity to have these conversations with medical oncologists," Dr. Rebecca A. Silliman of the Boston University School of Public Health, the study's lead author, told Reuters Health. While tamoxifen has long been recommended for older women with estrogen-receptor-positive breast cancers, except those with extremely low-risk tumors, older women are less likely than younger patients to receive definitive care, Silliman and her colleagues note in the medical journal Cancer. Silliman's team conducted the current study to see if older women who met with a medical oncologist were more likely to be prescribed tamoxifen therapy when appropriate. The study included 559 patients 65 years of age or older with early-stage breast cancer treated by 191 surgeons. The women were interviewed by telephone 3, 6 and 15 months after surgery. --more 2228 Local Time 1928 GMT
