Dr. Kristine Slam, COSABreast

11/05/2025

For today, I’m doing a “what the doctor does” summary 🙋‍♀️
Over the past year, I have been interested in the potential benefits of creatine on brain health in women, for mood disorders, cognitive function, Alzheimer’s risk reduction, and of course, the more traditionally known maintenance of muscle strength in perimenopausal and menopausal women.

Here is the meta-analysis illustrated the potential beneficial brain effects, 16 studies and nearly 500 women. More research is definitely warranted, but it’s enough for me to supplement daily.

Current evidence suggests that creatine monohydrate supplementation may confer beneficial effects on cognitive function in adults, particularly in the domains of memory, attention time, and information processing speed. Larger robust clinical trials are warranted to further validate these findings.....

10/29/2025

I just love when I read interesting things that can help patients that have essentially no risk. And are cost-effective!
Tightly fitting surgical gloves, placed on the hands during taxol based chemo to potentially lower the risk of neuropathy? Sign me up💕

New data spotlight strategies to prevent taxane neuropathy, manage hot flashes, assess cold caps with ADCs, and clarify breastfeeding safety — advancing quality of life for breast cancer patients.

10/29/2025

What a great event!

10/25/2025

Genetic testing of breast cancer over the past 10-15 years has substantially changed the landscape of treatment.
Multiple different tests are available, and are used for different reasons. From predicting the benefit of radiation for DCIS, to deciding if a patient is going to benefit from chemotherapy, to seeing benefit from prolonged endocrine therapy, tumor genetic testing is helpful for many curable stage breast cancer patients.
For metastatic patients, genetic testing is useful in precisely identifying mutations that could be used to target the second and third line therapies. 

One size fits all is a philosophy of the past in oncology. The future is personalisation -a case where each tumor has its own genetic story. A Turning Point in Oncology Breast cancer treatment has had a linear and standardised method of treatment over decades: surgery, chemotherapy, radiation, and h...

10/22/2025

This is a fascinating finding!

People with advanced lung or skin cancer who were taking certain immunotherapy drugs lived substantially longer if they also got a Pfizer or Moderna shot within 100 days of starting treatment, according to preliminary research being reported Wednesday in the journal Nature.

10/20/2025

Mammoglam this Thursday! I’ll be there for an informal talk at 5:45 PM. 

10/15/2025

Great study showing a low risk of breast recurrence at 10 years in young women with breast cancer (under age 40)💕☺️

The cumulative incidence of locoregional recurrence was 6.7% after breast-conserving therapy (lumpectomy), 6.5% after mastectomy without radiation, and 2.4% after mastectomy with radiation.

But does the choice of treatment — mastectomy vs breast-conserving therapy — affect patients’ risk for locoregional recurrence across molecular subtypes?

10/04/2025

Sharing this free event, focusing on genetic testing for Jewish populations in breast cancer!

Specifically, the Ashkenazi Jewish population has a higher than typical rate of BRCA gene mutations (many studies estimate a 1 in 40 risk of having this mutation if you’re a healthy Ashkenazi Jewish woman).
Knowledge is power!

Join us on October 19 at the Bob Crane Community Center for an engaging session exploring the intersection between genetics and Jewish

10/02/2025

I’ve been talking about breast cancer pinkwashing for years. Please, only support charities and products when you know the money is going back to breast cancer research or patient care. 

Think before you pink.

09/24/2025

Lowering the cost of care for cancer patients is something that is important to me. For many procedures, an ambulatory surgery center (ASC) provides the exact same quality of care, but at a fraction of the time and cost versus being performed in a hospital setting.  For many surgeries, the facility fee will be 3-8 times higher in the hospital setting versus an outpatient surgery center.

Patients have an opportunity to demand better information from hospitals and health systems—and market innovators can help fill the gap.

09/17/2025

Seriously, don’t forget your mammogram.
And yes, 40% of us have dense breasts, an anatomic description of how much fibrous tissue versus fatty tissue you have. 
And no, mammograms do not have a lot of radiation, the dose is exceptionally low and proven to be safe.