Clinical Trials and Research
The UCSF Breast Care Center is a nationally recognized leader in breast cancer research. Our clinicians are actively engaged in studies to advance all aspects of breast care including prevention, diagnosis, treatment and improving quality of life. They are also engaged in designing new processes for health care delivery, customized to the needs of individual breast cancer patients.
Reprinted by permission
from MacMillan
Publishers, Ltd.,
Nature Reviews Cancer 5, 591-602 (August 2005)*
What are clinical trials?
Clinical trials are research studies looking at new medical interventions in people. They allow new and improved options for care to be evaluated in a controlled setting before they are made available to all patients. Every advance in breast cancer care has been the result of a clinical trial. By participating in trials, patients have access to the latest medical knowledge about breast cancer and, for those who are no longer responding to standard treatment, the opportunity to receive experimental treatment. Our physicians encourage patients to consider clinical trials as an option for care as a potential benefit for themselves as well as for the extended breast cancer community.
To find out about clinical trials for which you may be eligible visit:
BreastCancerTrials.org
Developed at the UCSF Breast Care Center, BreastCancerTrials.org or BCT.org is a nationwide, clinical trial matching service that can help you find trials personalized to your situation. You can use the BCT.org matching service as a one-time guest or save your health history for continued matching. As an option, you can subscribe to the BCT.org Trial Alert Service in order to be notified whenever newly added trials match your history.
If you have never had breast cancer, but are interested in participated in a screening or prevention trial, use BCT.org to get a quick view of trials you may join:
BCT Quick View Screening Trials
BCT Quick View Prevention Trials
UCSF Breast Care Center Clinical Trials
This page contains information about breast cancer clinical trials that are currently open at UCSF. Once you have viewed the description, you can call (877) UCSF.CCC (877-827-3222) to speak to someone about whether you might be able to participate in a particular trial, or send an email with your questions or requests for more information.
Ongoing Breast Care Center Research
In addition to clinical trials, UCSF Breast Care Center investigators are involved in other types of breast cancer research. There are several long term research projects underway with UCSF Breast Care Center physicians as leaders:
Athena Breast Health Network
The Athena Breast Health Network is a recently-launched breast cancer prevention and treatment program that unites physicians, researchers, and patients at the five University of California medical centers, the UCSF Institute for Health Policy Studies, and the School of Public Health at UC Berkeley. We aim to reduce the number of women who develop breast cancer, to improve the survival of those women with aggressive forms of the disease, and to spare women with low-risk cancers the harmful effects of overtreatment by driving innovation in care. Therefore, the first group of women participating in Athena as patients will not have breast cancer when entering the network.
I-SPY 2 Breast Cancer Clinical Trial
Today most women with breast cancer receive standard chemotherapy. We know that some breast cancers respond well to standard chemotherapy but some do not. The I-SPY 2 TRIAL (Investigation of Serial Studies to Predict Your Therapeutic Response with Imaging And moLecular Analysis 2) is a clinical trial for women with newly diagnosed locally advanced breast cancer to test whether adding investigational drugs to standard chemotherapy is better than standard chemotherapy alone before having surgery.
To learn more about participating in the I-SPY 2 TRIAL, visit My Participation in I-SPY 2 and read and print the I-SPY 2 Patient Brochure.
To learn more about the procedures used in the I-SPY 2 TRIAL, visit I-SPY 2 Study Procedures.
Before making a decision to participate in the I-SPY 2 TRIAL, visit Things to Consider Before Joining the I-SPY 2 TRIAL.
To find out if this trial is open at a clinic near you, visit I-SPY 2 TRIAL Sites.
* Figure reprinted by permission from Macmillan Publishers Ltd: Britta Weigelt, Johannes L. Peterse, Laura J. van't Veer, Nature Reviews Cancer 5, 591-602 (August 2005), Figure 4.
