Can hormone blood tests help predict breast cancer chemo benefit?
Yes—one hormone test helped identify who benefited from chemo in a study of 1,556 women under 55.
But not every hormone test helped. FSH (Follicle-Stimulating Hormone) levels before treatment did not predict added benefit from chemotherapy. AMH (Anti-Müllerian Hormone), a marker of the remaining egg supply, did.
Researchers tested stored blood samples from the RxPONDER breast cancer study. The women had cancer fueled by hormones that had reached nearby lymph nodes. Their cancers did not have high levels of a protein called HER2. All had cancer recurrence scores of 25 or lower. These scores help estimate the chance of cancer returning.
The study compared hormone-blocking treatment alone with that treatment plus chemotherapy. Among women tested, 64% had the egg-supply marker at 10 pg/ml or higher. This group had better survival without invasive cancer when chemotherapy was added. The other 36% had levels below that cutoff. They showed no clear added benefit from chemotherapy. Results followed a similar pattern for cancer returning in distant body parts.
The marker predicted benefit better than age or menopause status. Still, these findings concern a specific breast cancer setting. They do not make an egg-supply test a general cancer screening tool.
For members tracking hormone bloodwork, the key lesson is about context. Different hormone tests do not answer the same question. When comparing numbers in BioSocial, recording units and whether bloodwork came before treatment can make those conversations clearer. This study examined starting levels, not whether changing a hormone level improves outcomes.
What have you learned from comparing your hormone results and testing context with others?
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