Chemotherapy-induced cardiotoxicity in breast cancer patients requires new diagnostic methods for early detection of subclinical myocardial dysfunction to prevent irreversible heart failure.
Highlights the clinical need for novel imaging methods to detect early, subclinical chemotherapy-induced cardiotoxicity in breast cancer patients before irreversible heart failure develops.
Breast cancer represents the most frequent form of neoplasia in women worldwide, being responsible of 1.6% of annual deaths. Therefore, it is a major public health issue and research in this field should be a priority. Chemoterapics drugs are extremly potent tools, which alone or in association to radiotherapy, increase survival and lower the reccurrence rate of cancer, but their use can be limited by cardiotoxicity. Cardiotoxicity can appear early or late after therapy, and may vary from subclinical myocardial dysfunction to irreversible heart failure. Currently, cardiac dysfunction induced by chemotherapy is diagnosed through classical echocardiographic parameters. However, these cannot detect subtle, early changes of cardiac structure and function. Consequently, description of new methods, which could detect cardiac dysfunction in an early stage, becomes essential for detecting the group of patients at risk for irreversible heart failure and for monitoring the treatment.
Florescu et al. (Wed,) conducted a review in Chemotherapy-induced cardiotoxicity in breast cancer. Chemotherapy was evaluated. Chemotherapy-induced cardiotoxicity in breast cancer patients requires new diagnostic methods for early detection of subclinical myocardial dysfunction to prevent irreversible heart failure.