According to the National Breast Cancer Foundation, one in eight women in the U.S. will be diagnosed with breast cancer in her lifetime. When you are diagnosed, your world turns upside down. As the initial shock fades, you, your doctor, and your family discuss the right treatment for you, your health, and quality of life.

With regular monograms, some women are able to catch the disease early enough to avoid the use of chemotherapy. For women with more advanced cancer, doctors usually recommend some combination of chemotherapy and targeted surgery.

It’s frightening, we know. But we believe it helps patients to understand which chemotherapies are on the market and what side effects are associated with each one. Some pharmaceuticals, like Taxotere (Docetaxel), come with more severe potential side effects than others – which leaves many survivors asking, is Taxotere a good chemo drug? While we are by no means offering medical guidance, in this post we offer a guide to understanding the drug therapies offered for the treatment of breast cancer and their potential side effects.

CHEMO DRUGS FOR BREAST CANCER STAGE 1 & 2

Early stage breast cancer usually refers to stage 1 or stage 2 cancer. These early stage cancers usually require chemotherapy. Stage 1 and stage 2 are similar, but slightly different. Stage 1 refers to a cancerous tumor in the breast that has not spread to the lymph nodes. Stage 2 refers to a larger tumor in the breast that has spread to some surrounding lymph nodes.

For smaller stage 1 cancerous tumors, most doctors will recommend drug therapy after surgery (you may know this as adjuvant therapy) while larger stage 2 cancerous tumors may require some chemotherapy treatment to shrink the tumor before surgery (neoadjuvant therapy). It helps to understand the pharmaceuticals that your doctor might recommend, their manufacturers, and the potential side effects of the chemotherapy treatments.

The most common drug treatments for early stage breast cancer are:

• Adriamycin: Also known as doxorubicin, is manufactured by Pfizer. Side effects include: heart problems, increased risk of bleeding due to low white blood cell count, nail changes, hair loss, mouth sores, nausea, vomiting, hand-foot syndrome and irregular periods.
• Adrucil: Also known as fluorouracil, is manufactured by Teva Parenteral Medicines, Inc. Side effects include: stomach ailments such as diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, loss of appetite, as well as mouth sores, taste changes, low white blood cell count, irregular periods, and hand-foot syndrome.
• Cytoxan: Also known as cyclophosphamide, is manufactured by Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS). Side effects include: stomach ailments such as diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, loss of appetite, sores on mouth or lips, and irregular periods.
• Ellence: Also known as epirubicin, is also manufactured by Pfizer. Ellence is known as the less toxic alternative to Adriamycin. Side effects include: stomach ailments such as diarrhea, nausea, vomiting in addition to mouth sores, hair loss, low white blood cell count, and irregular periods.
• Taxol: Also known as paclitaxel, is manufactured by Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS) and is prescribed to treat both early stage and late stage cancer. Side effects include: stomach ailments such as diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, in addition to susceptibility to infection, numbness in the fingers and toes, and mouth sores.
• Taxotere: Also known as docetaxel, is manufactured by Sanofi-Aventis and is prescribed to treat both early stage and late stage cancer. Taxotere is the only medication with adverse effects including substantial risk of permanent hair loss after chemotherapy. Other side effects include: stomach ailments such as nausea, vomiting, and constipation as well as numbness and pain in the body, susceptibility to infection, allergic reactions, fluid retention, and watery eyes.
• Paraplatin: Also known as carboplatin, is manufactured by Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS) is prescribed to treat both early stage and late stage cancer. Side effects include: stomach ailments such as nausea, vomiting, loss of appetite, kidney and nerve damage, low white blood cell count, irregular periods.

The chemotherapies listed above fall into different classes of drugs based on how each one attacks cancer cells. As a result, the treatments are usually prescribed in combination with one another for the best results. For example:

• Adriamycin and Ellence are anthracyclines which means these drugs go after cancer cells by harming their genes and making reproduction problematic
• Taxotere and Taxol are taxanes which target and disable cell division of cancer cells
• Adrucil (fluorouracil) is an antimetabolite therapy that kills cancer cells by acting as a part of the cell division process, tricking the cell, and causing it to die during division
• Cytoxan is an alkylating agent that weakens or kills cancer cells by altering the cancer cell’s genetic material
• Paraplatin is a platinum-based chemo drug that damages the genetic material of cancer cells and renders them unable to repair that damage

By combining these drugs and others in different ways, doctors are able to attack cancer cells from multiple angles. According to the National Cancer Institute, there are five chemo drug combinations used for breast cancer. Keep in mind that there are other combinations used:

• Adriamycin Cyclophosphamide (AC)
• Adriamycin Cyclophosphamide – Taxane (AC-T)
• Cyclophosphamide Adriamycin Fluorouracil (CAF)
• Cyclophosphamide Methotrexate Fluorouracil (CMF)
• Fluorouracil Epirubicin Hydrochloride Cyclophosphamide (FEC)
• Taxotere Adriamycin Cyclophosphamide (TAC)

While there are some similar treatments for early stage and late stage cancer treatment, there are some substantial differences.