Thousands more women with the world's most prevalent form of breast cancer might benefit from an innovative medicine that extends their lives and reduces their chances of relapse by a quarter.

Every year, more than 2 million women are diagnosed with the illness, which is the most common cancer in the world. Despite advances in treatment in recent decades, many individuals may experience cancer recurrence. If a recurrence occurs, it is usually at a later stage.

A promising study was revealed at the world's biggest cancer conference, the American Society of Clinical Oncology (Asco), indicating that ribociclib, a novel targeted treatment medicine, might be a game changer. According to trial data, it can improve survival and dramatically reduce the likelihood of cancer recurrence.

Ribociclib has previously been proven to improve survival in people with advanced breast cancer. However, researchers observed in a recent study that it may also improve outcomes for people with much earlier-stage illnesses, such as in the case where cancer has not yet reached lymph nodes.

The findings piqued the interest of researchers and oncologists at Asco's annual meeting in Chicago since the evidence shows that the medicine, also known as Kisqali, might prevent cancer from returning in a large population and influence global practice.

Ribociclib is a small molecule inhibitor, which is a type of targeted treatment. It acts by targeting CDK4 and CDK6 proteins in breast cancer cells, which regulate cell proliferation, including cancer cell growth.

The medicine reduced the chance of recurrence by 25% when administered in conjunction with normal hormone therapy compared to hormone therapy alone following traditional therapies, according to a late-stage experiment, and has been licensed by authorities in the UK and the US. 

Because of the large number of people it potentially aids, the earlier-stage setting, when tumors can still be surgically removed, is considered a far greater breakthrough.

Patients with breast cancer are often offered surgery, chemotherapy, or radiation treatment before being prescribed hormone-blocking medicines to try to prevent the illness from reoccurring.

The study discovered that combining ribociclib with hormone treatment resulted in a "significant improvement" in disease-free survival durations for patients with hormone receptor-positive, HER2-negative early-stage breast cancer.

Hormone receptor-positive, HER2-negative breast cancer is the most common subtype of the disease, making up nearly 70% of all breast cancer cases in the US.

According to lead author Dr. Dennis Slamon, “Currently, approved targeted treatments can only be used in a small population of patients diagnosed with hormone receptor-positive, HER2-negative early breast cancer, leaving many without an effective treatment option for reducing risk of the cancer returning."

Slamon explained that nearly one-third of people with stage two hormone receptor-positive HER2-negative will have a relapse after treatment and more than half with stage 3 will have the cancer make a full return.

“Thus, there is a significant unmet need for both reducing the risk of recurrence and providing a tolerable treatment option that keeps patients cancer-free without disrupting their daily life.”

The Natalee study involved 5,101 patients who were given either ribociclib for three years alongside five years of hormonal therapy or the hormonal therapy alone.

After three years, 90.4% of those taking ribociclib remained free of disease, compared with 87.1% in the hormonal therapy alone group. Ribociclib also showed more favorable outcomes in overall survival, recurrence-free survival, and distant disease-free survival, according to the researchers.

Dr. Rita Nanda, an Asco expert in Chicago, stated that the results suggest " there will be a role for adjuvant ribociclib for stage two and higher hormone receptor-positive, HER2-negative breast cancer,”

Dr Catherine Elliott, director of research and partnerships at Cancer Research UK called the findings "promising" although more research is needed.

“The combination of ribociclib and hormonal therapy could provide a new treatment option for people with this type of early-stage breast cancer, reducing the risk of the disease coming back and improving survival.”