Preventing Breast cancer - The IBIS-II International Breast Cancer Intervention Study
Transcript
Download the video here (WMV file, 124Mb)
[City of London Race for Life Footage]
Caroline Bundy (Participant): "I'm taking part in the trial because my mother had breast cancer and my sister had breast cancer, so obviously I'm at high risk to get it myself. I have another friend who in fact died of it and that was a terrible shot because she was pregnant and she only lived six months to see her baby and I think that, is something that I think about quite a bit and I'm very glad that if I can be on this trial to help anyone, especially to prevent them getting cancer at all, is very important to me."
Jill Knox (IBIS-II Clinical Project Manager): "IBIS-II trial is very important because breast cancer affects so many women and it's the most common cancer in women and IBIS-II is unique because it's a breast cancer prevention study. There's lots of data on treatment studies but there is not very much data on breast cancer prevention studies. So obviously we can prevent breast cancer, we can save a lot of lives and also save a lot of resources in the long term."
Professor Jack Cuzick (IBIS-II Lead Researcher): "The first prevention trial was called IBIS-I and it used a drug called Tamoxifen, which has also been used to treat breast cancer and the results were quite encouraging but there are some side effects with this drug, primarily blood clots and gynecological problems like endometrial cancer, so the obvious hope was to find a more effective drug that had less side effects and Tamoxifen and based on the recent result from treatment trials the aromatase inhibitor, in particular Anastrozole, looks to have both of those properties."
Caroline: "My name's Caroline Bundy, I'm a primary school teacher and I teach in a Primary school in London. I heard about the trial when I was at my regular yearly meeting at my breast clinic, at a hospital I go to in Epping and the consultant told me about it and asked me if I'd be interested in taking part in it."
Jill: "My name is Jill Knox and I'm the Clinical Project Manager for IBIS-II. My role is really to ensure that the projects running smoothly and it's a very large project running in lots of different countries. All women have to be post menopausal, aged between 40 and 70 because age is a risk for breast cancer. The older you get the more likely you are to get it. So it's based upon family history, a previous benign disease and family history of breast cancer or ovarian cancer."
Professor Jack Cuzick: "The study is a long term study. It will involve 6000 high risk women. If a woman wants to join the trial, it involves taking a tablet for five years, which is either the active treatment or the placebo."
Caroline: "…taking the tablets every day is a minute thing to do…they're very small tablets and it doesn't have any effect on my life at all, I just take the pill every morning and it's as simple as that."
Professor Jack Cuzick: "Additionally we look after the women very, very well. They have to get a base line mammogram to make sure they don't have cancer to begin with…"
Caroline: "Yes you get very specialised treatment when you are on this trial. At the beginning of the trial you have a bone scan which isn't something that I would've been able to have, so I know that my bones have been checked. I meet my research nurse Caroline, she takes me for my blood tests, that I only had to have at the beginning and end of the first year and it's going very well and it's so easy to do."
"The IBIS-II trial sends me the regular update which is very interesting to see how many people are coming on board, where they're recruiting from, how their recruiting is going and any latest developments. There's lots of letters from participants as well so that's interesting to know that you're not just…you know you are one in lots of thousands but it's nice to hear other peoples points of views."
Professor Jack Cuzick: "Cancer Research UK plays a very important role; they've fostered both our initial trial and also then very important in terms of helping us, set this trial up. The trial is run in a Cancer Research UK unit with support from both industry and Cancer Research UK. They also play a major role I think in terms of making people aware of the trial and the importance of prevention."
Caroline: "Well I think Cancer Research UK are brilliant, I donate regularly to them, I have a standing order which I send every month because I've been so closely linked with cancer I think it's the one that I think if we can make trials, things succeed, if they're going to work, I think it's brilliant Cancer Research UK are doing really wonderful work."
Professor Jack Cuzick: "I think the prevention of disease is an important aspect to life in general, I think we all want to live a life without disease and one of the areas of course which is a current real problem is breast cancer because it's co common. So there's both the intellectual challenge of figuring out how to do this and also the public health feeling that you're actually dealing with a problem that's important for humanity in general and that you can really do something useful and good."
Jill: "The most common reason why these ladies took part in the trial seem to be that they were doing it for the future female generations of their families, for their daughters, their nieces, their granddaughters."
Caroline: "…that was my first introduction to breast cancer when my mother had it. My mother survived and did very, very well and then my sister got it and it was like goodness, you know, but then there was no really doubt in my mind, which perhaps was very naïve, that she wasn't going to survive. I think because my mum had but then having Debbie who didn't survive, it really rounds it home that a lot of people don't survive it and that we must do something about it."
"…Debbie, she'd be absolutely delighted and I saw her 15 year old daughter the other day and she is the image of her mother. I was talking to her and I was saying to her ‘you know we all loved your mother very, very much' and she needs to know what a wonderful character her mother was and I think Debbie would be absolutely delighted that I'm helping in some way, so that people won't suffer like she did."
