Endocrine Abstracts

In normal physiology, glucocorticoid receptor (GR) activation regulates cell type-dependent genes whose products influence metabolism, inflammation, cell cycle and apoptosis/cell survival pathways. Synthetic GR agonists, or glucocorticoids (GCs), are often used to treat hematologic malignancies because of GR’s ability to induce proapoptotic gene expression, inhibit nuclear factor–κB, and induce cell cycle arrest. In contrast, recent examination of GR expression ...

Early-stage ER+ breast cancer (BC) with high tumor glucocorticoid receptor (GR) expression is associated with improved long term relapse-free survival compared to tumors with low GR expression. In addition, GR activity inhibits ER-mediated BC cell proliferation. We therefore hypothesized that GR and ER engage in nuclear receptor crosstalk to influence pro-proliferative gene expression, thus contributing to a better outcome in ER+/GR+ breast cancer. To understand the mechanisms...