If the hormone test is negative, then there is only a very small chance it will help. There are several types of hormonal treatments used in adjuvant therapy. Tamoxifen Tamoxifen is a medicine that blocks the action of the female hormone estrogen in breast cancer cells. It is taken as a pill, usually once or twice a day. When tamoxifen is part of an adjuvant therapy program, the usual recommendation is to give it for five years.
Tamoxifen usually has mild side effects, and many women have no side effects at all.
It does not cause many of the more severe side effects people associate with chemotherapy. Overall Benefit Many clinical studies show that former breast cancer patients live longer and better if they take tamoxifen. For women with the most common types of breast cancer, it can reduce the risk of microscopic cancer seeds growing. Ovarian Ablation Ovarian ablation causes the ovaries to stop making the female hormones estrogen and progesterone. It works because the ovaries are the major source of estrogen in premenopausal women, and it deprives breast cancers of the female hormones many of them need to grow.