Chemotherapy given before surgery to remove cancer is called neoadjuvant treatment. An oncologist might recommend this based of the size of the tumor -- it being very large. The idea is to shrink the tumor and then have surgery to remove the cancer.

Having chemotherapy administered while the tumor is still there can show what drugs are working and what drugs have no effect on the tumor. Chemotherapy when started immediately, not after surgery with healing time needed, gives the patient systematic treatment right away. This could be beneficial and is why physicians might recommend this form of treatment. The truth is they don't know if it is better or not.

Of course, every case of breast cancer is different. We all need to make tough decisions regarding our treatment plan. The facts are that currently there is no evidence that survival is improved with neoadjuvant verses adjuvant (after surgery) chemotherapy in women with locally advanced breast cancer.

The clinical trials that are done help physicians understand what treatments are more effective. Results from a Phase II clinical trial was published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. It stated that neoadjuvant treatment with Taxotere, Navelbine, and Herceptin resulted in a complete disappearance of detectable cancer in 39 percent of women with locally advanced HER2 positive breast cancer.

The study showed that after two years followup, on the thirty one women with locally advanced breast cancer involved in the study, the overall survival was 97 percent and cancer free survival was 84 percent.

So, the message here is that, even though the study group was small, the results showed a good response to this treatment plan.

A new study shows certain genes may make some lung cancer patients more sensitive to chemotherapy. This is a good thing -- increased sensitivity in this case means lower doses of drug therapy work as good or better than higher doses.

Researchers looked at more than 21,000 genes in cells common to non-small-cell lung cancer, the most common type of the disease. Of these genes, 87 came up with heightened sensitivity to the chemotherapy drug Taxol. To be exact, the genes were 1,000 times more sensitive when exposed to the drug for 48 hours.

Chemotherapy is a very blunt instrument, says one researcher. Locating genes that make chemotherapy drugs more potent at lower doses is a critical step toward tailoring treatment and minimizing side effects for patients.

Two other drugs -- Navelbine and Gemzar -- were tested on six of the Taxol-sensitive genes. The genes did not respond to these drugs.

Researchers in Spain conducted a Phase III clinical trial called GEICAM. They wanted to compare different chemotherapy regimes in women diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer. The trial included 252 women who had already been treated with anthracyclines and taxanes and experienced a recurrence.

One group of women was treated with Gemzar (gemcitabine) and Navelbine (vinorelbine), the other group was treated with Navelbine alone. The results were published in Lancet Oncology that states the combination of the two drugs improves progression free survival. It was also mentioned that this combination however did not improve overall survival.

When cancer recurs following treatment with anthracyclines and taxanes, some of the strongest chemotherapies for breast cancer, patients have limited treatment options. Researchers continue to search for different chemotherapy combinations that are effective against recurrent breast cancer.

The researchers concluded that anticancer responses were 36 percent for patients treated with Gemzar/Navelbine and 26 percent for patients treated with Navelbine alone.

Lung cancer remains the leading cause of cancer-related death in the United States. Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) comprises the majority of lung cancers.

According to the results presented at the 2006 annual meeting of the European Society for Medical Oncology, the combination consisting of Platinol (cisplatin) plus Navelbine (vinorelbine) improves survival among non-small cell lung cancer patients whose cancer has been surgically removed.

Early stage lung cancer is usually treated with surgery, chemotherapy or radiation therapy. The use of adjuvant chemotherapy has not shown in the past to have improved survival.

This study included data from almost two thousand patients with early stage lung cancer. Patients were treated with either adjuvant Platinol/Navelbine or no chemotherapy at all. The study showed that at five years 55 percent of patients who were treated with the chemotherapy combination were alive compared to only 46 percent who received no further treatment after surgery.

The researchers concluded that adjuvant chemotherapy consisting of Platinol/Navelbine improves survival at five years among patients with NSCLC who were able to have their cancer completely removed by surgery.