Duke is involved in a variety of efforts to study why breast cancer arises, ways to prevent it, how to detect it earlier, and how to eradicate the disease once it has formed. A sampling is highlighted below.

• Duke’s one-of-a-kind “jacuzzi” table uses radio frequency energy to heat the cancerous breast in a pool of water, thus drawing chemotherapy drugs toward the precise location of the tumor. Studies show that this type of hypothermia treatment boosts the killing power of chemotherapy by up to 10 times.
• The Breast Wellness Clinic at Duke provides a whole-person approach to assessing breast cancer risk, treating menopause in high-risk women, and providing new research techniques such as random fine-needle aspiration to test for precancerous breast changes. For the first time ever, women can be tested for subtle signs that cancer may be brewing in a few errant cells amidst thousands of healthy ones.
• Radiologists with specialized training in breast imaging use the most advanced techniques to detect and diagnose breast cancer. Breast imaging radiologists are skilled in all forms of minimally invasive biopsy techniques, including needle core biopsies using stereotactic and ultrasound guidance, and pre-surgical wire localizations.
• Duke surgeons are among the most experienced surgeons in the nation in the more targeted, less invasive procedure called sentinel node biopsy in which fewer lymph nodes are removed than in traditional lymph node surgery.
• Duke offers clinical trials for all stages of breast cancer. These trials include treatments that are only available at Duke, such as breast cancer vaccines, to nationwide trials sponsored by the National Cancer Institute.
• Duke genomic experts have developed a system that enables them to predict, with 90 percent accuracy, whether a woman’s breast cancer tumor has extensively spread to her lymph nodes. The new system also accurately predicted certain women’s chances of a recurrence within three years.
• Duke anesthesiologists pioneered the paravertebral block method of anesthesia, which has contributed to the improved recovery of women undergoing mastectomies and breast conservation. General anesthesia is no longer required.
• Scientists at Duke have created a new breast scanner that will dramatically improve their ability to visualize small tumors while also reducing radiation exposure to one-tenth that of normal mammograms.
• Duke scientists are developing innovative therapies that use a patient's own immune system to fight breast cancer.