Fight Breast Cancer

Fight Breast Cancer

Scottsdale – University of California medical centers are putting their heads together in an effort to study breast cancer like it has never been studied before. All  UC medical center are participating in an unprecedented statewide collaboration to improve care for breast cancer by designing and testing new  research, technology and health care delivery systems. The program is called the ATHENA Breast Health Network, and will initially involve 150,000 women throughout California who will be screened for breast cancer and followed for decades through the five UC medical centers.

“ATHENA is a model of multi-institutional collaboration and demonstrates the enormous potential in shared systems,” said Dr. John D. Stobo and UC senior vice president for health sciences and services. “This is a great example demonstrating that the total of what can be accomplished by UC functioning as a system far exceeds the sum of contributions by the individual campuses. ATHENA represents an unprecedented opportunity to play a leadership role in driving critical changes in health care. The public nature of the UC institutions make them uniquely positioned to study the appropriateness and effectiveness of treatment. It also allows for the applied use of new scientific evidence, much of which has been developed in the UC medical centers, to truly change the delivery of care.”

The plan has a very ambitious goal – to generate a large amount of data that can be used later to improve breast cancer care!  All women undergoing screening and treatment will be asked to contribute information about themselves, risk factors they have, health status, and other related lifestyle behaviors, such as diet, tobacco and drug use, environmental factors, gynecological history and family risk.

“The ATHENA Breast Health Network provides a first-time opportunity for the five UC cancer centers to leverage their collective research strengths in tackling important scientific and clinical questions in breast cancer,” said Dr. Dennis Carson the director of the Moores UCSD Cancer Center. This exciting news was reported through the UC San Diego News Report and the UCSD Moores Cancer Center.

After the information is gathered it will be used to help improve treatment but also to target prevention services.  The UC system is particularly well-positioned for a project of ATHENA’s magnitude because the medical centers annually screen as many as 80,000 women, and diagnose 2,500 patients with breast cancer.The project is expected to generate a rich collection of data and knowledge that will shape breast cancer care in the way the renowned Framingham heart study changed the care of patients with heart disease.

While ambitious – this type of study has been needed for a long time. I believe that once the data is analyzed- the infromation will have the potential to change the face of breast cancer prevention and treatment.