Further to Wolfgang's post, there was some stuff in NewScientist the other week about disease treatment. One problem is that there are generally several different ways of curing a disease; as an example, you may get 40% who'll respond to treatment A, 40% who'll respond to treatment B, 10% who'll respond to either, and 10% who won't get better under either treatment. Trouble is that you don't know in advance which group you're in, so the best you can do is take one treatment with a 40% chance of a cure, then try the other one. On the C theme for instance, some respond well to chemo, some don't. When the "cure" is as radical as chemo or a mastectomy, it'd be good to know in advance which treatment to get so that it doesn't mess you up.

Anyway, there seems to be some genetic factor that affects which group you fit in (or to be more precise, which group your lump fits in, bcos it's the lump's response to the cure that you want to know about). If the docs can work that out then they can target ppl with the cure that best suits them, and the research is happening on this. Ironically it's coming round to the Chinese medicine principle of giving the patient a treatment specific to their needs - although it's more likely to work than powdered rhino horn and other quack remedies! ;-)

Graham.