Has there been progress in pharmacotherapy for breast cancer patients?

Breast cancer is the most frequent type of cancer in women. The therapeutic approaches to breast cancer have developed rapidly over the past 20 years, due to the increasing knowledge about the biology of breast cancer. Theref ore it was possible to increase response rates as well as the duration of r esponse and survival in neoadjuvant, adjuvant, and palliative treatment. Th is paper gives a review of the current breast cancer trials. Effective new cytotoxic chemotherapy and hormonal therapy agents, as well as the identifi cation of specific molecular abnormalities (HER2/neu) led to the developmen t of targeted therapeutic interventions in the neoadjuvant, adjuvant, and p alliative treatment of breast cancer. increased understanding of the biolog y of breast cancer led to the development of rational therapeutic intervent ions, which are currently under active clinical development.