Introduction: To evaluate long term clinical outcome and prognostic factors after accelerated partial breast irradiation (APBI) in the elderly using high-dose-rate interstitial multi-catheter brachytherapy (HIBT).Material and methods: Between 2005 and 2018, 109 patients underwent APBI using HIBT (34 Gy/10f/5d or 32 Gy/8f/4d). Based on a prospective database, outcomes were retrospectively analyzed (local relapse-free survival (LRFS), metastatic-free survival (MFS), specific survival (SS) and overall survival (OS). Prognostic factors were investigated. Late toxicity and cosmetic evaluation were reported.Results: With a median follow-up of 97 months [7–159], median age was 81.7 years [58-89]. According to the GEC-ESTRO APBI classification, 72.5%, 11.9% and 15.6% were classified as low, intermediate and high-risk respectively. The histological type was mainly invasive ductal carcinoma (87.1%). The median tumor size was 10 mm [range 1-35]. Eight-year LRFS, SS and OS were 96.7% [95% CI [0.923; 1]), 96.7% [95% CI [0.924; 1] and 72%[95% CI [0.616; 0.837] respectively. In univariate analysis, APBI classification was not cosidered as prognostic factor, whilemolecular classification was prognostic factor for OS (p<0.0001), SS (p=0.007) and MFS (p=0.009) but not for LR (p=0.586). No Grade ³3 late toxicity was observed while 61 patients (88.4%) and 8 patients (11.6%) presented grade 1 and 2 toxicities respectively. Cosmetic outcome was excellent/good for 96.4%.Conclusion: Long-term follow-up confirms that HIBT is safe and effective for elderly early breast cancer. Our results suggest that selected elderly women presenting with high-risk breast cancer could be also considered for APBI.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.