Role of Hormones
Age distribution and relation to breastfeeding duration is suggestive of some sort of involvement of hormones in the aetiology, however significant differences exist compared to normal breast cancer.
Typically IBC shows low levels of estrogen and progesterone receptor sensitivity corresponding with poor outcome. In cases with positive estrogen receptor status antihormonal treatment is believed to improve outcome.
Paradoxically some findings suggest that especially aggressive phenotypes of IBC are characterised by high level of NF kappaB target gene expression which can be - under laboratory conditions successfully modulated by estrogen but not tamoxifen.
Read more about this topic: Inflammatory Breast Cancer
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