• Breast Cancer Drug Therapy
• Highlights
• Introduction
• Risk Factors
• Prevention and Lifestyle Factors
• Symptoms
• Diagnosis

Chemotherapy

Chemotherapy drugs are "cytotoxic" (cell-killing) drugs. They are given orally or by injection. They work systemically by killing cancer cells throughout the body. (Unfortunately, they also kill some normal cells, which accounts for many of their side effects.) Chemotherapy is always used for advanced breast cancer, but may also be used to treat types of early-stage breast cancer.

Newer biologic drugs target specific proteins involved in cancer. Treatment with these drugs is called...