Breast cancer is a significant health problem for women in the United States and throughout the world. Although advances have been made in detection and treatment of the disease, breast cancer remains the most common form of cancer, and the second leading cause of cancer death, in American women. Among African-American women and women between 15 and 54 years of age, breast cancer is the leading cause of cancer death. One out of every eight women in the United States will develop breast cancer, a risk which has increased 52% during 1950–1990. In 1994, it is estimated that 182,000 new cases of female breast cancer were diagnosed, and 46,000 women died from the disease.
No vaccine or other universally successful method for the prevention or treatment of breast cancer is currently available. Management of the disease currently relies on a combination of early diagnosis (through routine breast screening procedures) and aggressive treatment, which may include one or more of a variety of treatments such as surgery, radiotherapy, chemotherapy and hormone therapy. The course of treatment for a particular breast cancer is often selected based on a variety of prognostic parameters, including an analysis of specific tumor markers. However, the use of established markers often leads to a result that is difficult to interpret.
With current therapies, tumor invasiveness and metastasis is a critical determinant in the outcome for breast cancer patients. Although the five year survival for women diagnosed with localized breast cancer is about 90%, the five year survival drops to 18% for women whose disease has metastasized. Present therapies are inadequate for inhibiting tumor invasiveness for the large population of women with this severe disease.
Accordingly, improvements are needed in the treatment, diagnosis and prevention of breast cancer. The present invention fulfills this need and further provides other related advantages.