Chemotherapy is used to treat various cancers including breast cancer. In chemotherapy treatment,  drugs or chemicals are used to eradicate cancerous cells that divide at a faster rate. There are different chemotherapy drugs available for the treatment of breast cancer. Your doctor will recommend one of these drugs for treating breast cancer. Usually you are recommended a combination of three chemotherapy drugs for the breast cancer chemotherapy treatment. However in some cases, doctor may suggest only one drug, because of the use of one or a single drug it is also known as single drug chemotherapy.

Commonly used Chemotherapy Drugs for Treating Breast Cancer include:

• Cyclophosphamide
• Epirubicins
• 5-Fluorouracil or 5 FU
• Methotrexate
• Mitomycin
• Mitozantrone (mitoxantrone)
• Doxorubicin (Adriamycin)
• Docetaxel (Taxotere)
• Paclitaxel (Taxol)
• Vinorelbine (Navelbine)
• Gemcitabine (Gemzar)
• Capecitabine (Xeloda)
• Carboplatin (Paraplatin)

Adjuvant chemotherapy (chemotherapy applied after surgery or radiation) is applied to treat breast cancer. Adjuvant chemotherapy for breast cancer usually consists of 4 to 8 cycles of a combination of drugs including an anthracycline (epirubicin or doxorubicin). Chemotherapy drug docetaxel (Taxotere) can be used for women with early stage breast cancer after surgery. Docetaxel can be used in combination with doxorubicin and cyclophosphamide (i.e. the TAC regime).

According to studies, combination chemotherapy is more effective than single drug chemotherapy.

Other commonly applied combinations of chemotherapy drugs for breast cancer include:

• CMF (Cyclophosphamide or Cytoxan, Methotrexate and Fluorouracil or 5-FU)
• FEC (Epirubicin, Cyclophosphamide and Fluorouracil or 5-FU)
• E-CMF (Epirubicin which is followed by CMF)
• AC (Doxorubicin (Adriamycin) and Cyclophosphamide)
• MMM (Methotrexate, Mitozantrone and Mitomycin)
• MM (Methotrexate and Mitozantrone)
• CAF or FAC (Cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin (Adriamycin), and 5-Fluorouracil)
• EC (Epirubicin and Cyclophosphamide)
• TAC (docetaxel (Taxotere), doxorubicin (Adriamycin) andCyclophosphamide)
• AC-T (doxorubicin (Adriamycin) and Cyclophosphamide followed by paclitaxel (Taxol) or docetaxel)
• A-CMF (doxorubicin (Adriamycin), followed by CMF)
• TC (docetaxel (Taxotere) and Cyclophosphamide)
• GT (gemcitabine (Gemzar) and paclitaxel (Taxol))

Some other chemotherapy drugs used to treat women with breast cancer include carboplatin (Paraplatin), cisplatin, vinorelbine (Navelbine), capecitabine (Xeloda), ixabepilone (Ixempra), and albumin-bound paclitaxel (Abraxane).

Breast cancer chemotherapy drugs when administered can also damage normal cells along with the cancer cells. This causes side effects to the patient and also has an ill-effect on the chemotherapy treatment. Normal body cells including skin, hair, nails and the lining of your digestive system may get damaged by chemotherapy drugs. Most common side effects associated with chemotherapy drugs are nausea, vomiting, fatigue, hair loss, memory loss, mouth sores, sickness, increased chance of infections, bleeding, loss of appetite and others. Different combinations of chemotherapy drugs have different side effects.