Nancy Davidson, an expert in chemotherapy, has told the American Society of Breast Disease's annual symposium that the introduction of platinum into new 'adjuvant' techniques had so far proved effective.

The professor of oncology at Johns Hopkins medical school in Baltimore, Maryland, said that studies involving the Breast Cancer International Research Group had used a novel combination of platinum salts.

If the combination is effective, it will have a number of possibilities in the adjuvant setting, Dr Davidson said.