LOS ANGELES, May 14 (Xinhua) -- Researchers at the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) have identified structural changes in breast connective tissue that are linked to a higher risk of developing aggressive breast cancer, according to a new study published on Wednesday.
The findings, published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, suggest that these changes, referred to as stromal disruption, could serve as a potential biomarker to identify women at greater risk, even before cancer develops.
The research also found that stromal disruption is associated with poorer survival outcomes among women already diagnosed with invasive breast cancer.
The team used machine learning to analyze over 9,000 breast tissue samples, including healthy breast tissues, benign breast disease biopsies, and cancerous tissues. They discovered that stromal disruption was more common in women with risk factors for aggressive breast cancer, such as obesity, Black race, early age, multiple childbirths, and a family history of the disease.
In women with benign breast disease, substantial stromal disruption was linked to a significantly higher likelihood of developing breast cancer and a faster disease onset. Among breast cancer patients, those with greater stromal disruption were more likely to have aggressive cancer subtypes and lower survival rates, especially in estrogen receptor-positive cases.
Such insights could help inform the development of cancer prevention and treatment strategies that target the stromal microenvironment. In addition, stromal disruption is inexpensive to assess and could be widely adopted, particularly in low-resource settings where molecular analysis is impractical or very expensive, according to the study.
