Grant Supports Research of Targeted Breast Cancer Treatments

The UNM Can­cer Cen­ter received a grant from Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Mex­ico to sup­port inno­v­a­tive breast can­cer research that could lead to more effec­tive treat­ments. The grant funds Eric Prossnitz’s research, devel­op­ing mol­e­c­u­lar probes that tar­get a type of estro­gen recep­tor – iden­ti­fied and char­ac­ter­ized by Pross­nitz and col­lab­o­ra­tors – that plays an impor­tant role in breast can­cer. These probes show promise as the basis for tar­geted ther­a­pies for breast can­cer, par­tic­u­larly those forms that resist exist­ing chemother­apy treatments.

Breast can­cer accounts for nearly one third of women’s can­cer cases in New Mex­ico. Each year, 1,100 New Mex­i­can women are diag­nosed with inva­sive breast can­cer and another 220 die from the dis­ease. Breast can­cer is the lead­ing cause of can­cer death among His­panic, Native Amer­i­can and African Amer­i­can women in the state, and sec­ond only to lung can­cer among non-Hispanic white women.

Pross­nitz co-leads the Women’s Can­cers Research Pro­gram at the UNM Can­cer Cen­ter and is a pro­fes­sor of cell biol­ogy and phys­i­ol­ogy at UNM. He said, “Research is essen­tial to bet­ter under­stand­ing the biol­ogy of breast can­cer and improv­ing treat­ment options for women with the dis­ease. We are very pleased that BCBSNM has cho­sen to sup­port impor­tant breast can­cer research hap­pen­ing here in New Mexico.”

“We strongly sup­port trans­lat­ing sci­en­tific dis­cov­ery into new and more effec­tive treat­ments for breast can­cer,” said Liz Watrin, pres­i­dent, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Mexico.

Pross­nitz and col­leagues hope to make ther­a­pies avail­able to can­cer patients in New Mex­ico through the rig­or­ous clin­i­cal trial phase of research required of all new treat­ments. Melanie Royce, nation­ally known breast can­cer spe­cial­ist who directs the UNM Can­cer Center’s mul­ti­dis­ci­pli­nary breast can­cer pro­gram, said that BCBSNM’s sup­port of Prossnitz’s research will help accel­er­ate progress in find­ing effec­tive new ways to treat New Mexico’s breast can­cer patients.

“The UNM Can­cer Cen­ter is com­mit­ted to trans­lat­ing the work that goes on in our lab­o­ra­to­ries to our clin­ics and com­mu­ni­ties and back again for con­tin­ued inves­ti­ga­tion,” Royce said. “We are thrilled to receive BCBSNM’s sup­port for an extremely promis­ing area of trans­la­tional research at the center.”

Media Con­tacts: Dorothy Horn­beck, JKPR, (505) 797‑6673, dhornbeck@jameskorenchen.com or Audrey Man­ring, UNM Can­cer Cen­ter, (505) 925‑0486, amanring@salud.unm.edu