When BCRF investigator Dr. Suzanne Fuqua was diagnosed with stage 1 lobular breast cancer at the end of 2022, she felt confident she could deal with it.
“I trusted the technology, and I trusted my care team. It hadn’t spread. I wasn’t scared or overly concerned,” she said. “I know that sounds weird, but I knew what I was in for. And as we got more information from the biopsy and learned it was estrogen receptor–positive, I thought: I’m in my wheelhouse. I understood the molecular biology of it quite well.”
Other than her age and dense breast status, Dr. Fuqua had no risk factors for breast cancer and had had a clear mammogram the year prior. When she went for her annual screening two years ago, nothing showed up on an ultrasound. But when her care team performed 3D tomosynthesis (also known as 3D mammography), they found what looked like a spider in an area of her breast.
“It was a perfect example of lobular breast cancer,” Dr. Fuqua said. “I knew immediately that I had cancer, and then the biopsy confirmed it. It would have been missed if I hadn’t had 3D tomosynthesis.”
About 10 to 15 percent of breasts cancers are invasive lobular carcinoma, originating in the milk-producing lobules of the breast. Unlike invasive ductal carcinomas, lobular tumors grow in single-file strands rather than lumps (hence the spider-like appearance on Dr. Fuqua’s imaging). It also metastasizes in unique ways. Despite its prevalence as the second-most common form of breast cancer, lobular has been misunderstood and understudied. But in recent years, thanks to the work of BCRF investigators and others, we’ve made progress.
In early 2023, Dr. Fuqua had a lumpectomy and radiation, and then she started on hormone therapy to reduce her risk of recurrence. As a breast cancer researcher, she was very active in decisions about her care, basing them on research, including her own study of mutations in the ESR1 gene.
“I had the best care team, and everything went well,” she said. “When I go for follow-up appointments with my medical oncologist, we talk about science the whole time.”
For Dr. Fuqua, the hardest part of the experience was sharing her diagnosis with others.
“I’m a very strong, independent person. I didn’t want my friends and family to worry about me,” she said.
On the other side of treatment, Dr. Fuqua says she’s working harder than ever and has no plans to retire. She’s trying to get a potential new therapy to clinical trial and applied for five new grants, and she continues to mentor the next generation of scientists. In her research and outside of it, she’s become an advocate for lobular breast cancer, collaborating on new lobular-focused research and sharing her experience to highlight the need for more lobular clinical trials and study.
“Everybody goes, ‘Aren’t you going to retire?’ I say, ‘Not as long as I’m productive and have new ideas,’” she said. “As long as I’m helping others and educating the next generation, I will keep going. I’m collaborating more than I always have. I think my science has been reinvigorated in some way. I want to get more to clinical trial. I’ve accomplished a lot and I’m very proud of my earlier work. But this has made me recommitted to my science in a way.”
Earlier in her career, Dr. Fuqua had published a paper showing that there were estrogen receptor mutations in metastatic tumors that weren’t found in primary tumors. At the time, it was thought that primary and metastatic tumors were one in the same, informing how patients were treated. Metastatic tumors were also rarely biopsied, but Dr. Fuqua had access to metastatic samples working under the late pioneering breast cancer researcher Dr. William L. McGuire, who had created an unprecedented bank of thousands of frozen tumor samples. Dr. Fuqua manually sequenced the DNA of metastatic and primary tumors to compare them, a painstaking and time-consuming process.
“That was met with deep skepticism—and then it got worse,” she remembered. “People said I made it all up; I cheated. It was nasty. It was a really difficult time.”
But she persevered, writing more grants and getting additional funding to pursue this research, which proved her hypothesis over and over.
“I put my head down and didn’t let it bother me,” she said. “The data always added up that I was right.”
When Dr. Fuqua applied to become a BCRF investigator 10 years ago, her findings still hadn’t been widely accepted by the scientific community, but BCRF was willing to take a chance on her. With BCRF support, she set out to create a bank of metastatic models to sequence and look for potential treatments, like the one she’s trying to get to clinical trial today.
“BCRF invited me in in an atmosphere where people thought I was wrong, and they let me run,” she said. “I couldn’t have done any of this without BCRF money. So many other grants I’ve gotten are because I learned something with BCRF funding.”
For the last decade, Dr. Fuqua has not only appreciated the steady funding BCRF provides, but the opportunity for collaboration the organization fosters.
“BCRF funds the crème de la crème of scientists that are doing innovative work, and it allows scientists to use their imaginations,” she said. “I walk away from meetings with other BCRF researchers planning to collaborate with two, three, four more people. You’re not just funding the science and innovation, but the togetherness of a group. When we put our minds together around a table, that’s where science is invented. Those interactions have really helped my career and my science.”
Dr. Fuqua credits research for giving her the best possible outcome after her diagnosis—and it’s what motivates her to work harder than ever in her own lab now.
“I wouldn’t be here today if it wasn’t for research,” she said. “I also know that if the worst happened and it came back, we’re already working on the drugs of the future.”“I truly believe that because of BCRF research I am doing well, and with continued research and ample funding, I have faith that I and others with a breast cancer diagnosis will be able to live our best lives,” she said.
Please remember BCRF in your will planning. Learn More
2X MATCH
Today, your gift is DOUBLED for 2X the impact on lifesaving research.
