TREATMENT OF CARCINOMA OF THE HUMAN BREAST WITH TESTOSTERONE PROPIONATE:1A REPORT OF FIVE CASES

Abstract

THE relationship of sex hormones and neoplasms has been the stimulus for a great deal of investigation in recent years. Loeb and his associates (8, 9) using mice as experimental animals, demonstrated a definite relationship between estrogenic hormone and mammary carcinoma. By means of castration they were able to decrease the incidence of spontaneous carcinoma of the breast in mice. Lacassagne (6) in 1936 and Suntzèff, et al. (12) in 1936 lowered the tumor age and increased the tumor incidence of breast carcinoma in various strains of mice by using estrogenic substance. Clinically, withdrawal of estrogen by surgical or roentgen castration as an adjunct in the treatment of carcinoma of the human breast is an old and acceptable procedure (2). Following Lacassagne's (7) pioneer work in the use of testosterone propionate in mammary carcinoma of mice, Nathanson and Andervont (11) using the androgen in larger doses, decreased the incidence of mammary tumors in a high tumor strain of mice. Ulrich (13) applied this form of therapy to humans and obtained a favorable response in two patients with inoperable mammary carcinoma. Loeser (10) treated five cases of recurrent carcinoma of the breast with large doses of androgen and noted improvement and no further recurrence for as long as five years. Fels (5) described three cases with good results in one and questionable results in the other two. Boger (3) reported one case treated with a combination of surgical castration and methyl testosterone orally, obtaining relief of pain and recalcification of osteolytic lesions. Adair and Herrmann (1) added eleven cases to the literature with favorable results in four. Farrow and Woodward (4) using smaller doses of androgen in a series of thirty-three patients obtained equivocal results. We wish to report five cases treated with testosterone propionate² in which results are sufficiently promising to warrant further investigation.