Hormonal Management of Endocrine-Related Cancer

Abstract

Of all the mysteries of cancer biology, surely the role of hormones in treatment is one of the most complex and intriguing enigmas. In almost a century since oophorectomy was first used for the treatment of advanced breast cancer, we have developed an enormous background of observation with little understanding of the process. In the last decade, the identification of receptor proteins has generated the capacity to study biologic events at the cellular level, and new agents, specifically the antiestrogens and adrenal blockers, have changed the hormonal management of cancer for the first time in three decades or more. These developments have prompted Basil Stoll to develop a second-generation text from that previously published in 1972,<i>Endocrine Therapy in Malignant Disease</i>. The need for a comprehensive text on endocrine aspects of malignancy has been obvious, and the vacuum has existed in part because of our ignorance but also because of