Preoperative systemic therapy in locally advanced breast cancer: a single institution experience

Abstract

Background:Locally advanced breast cancer (LABC) is common in developing countries and it frequently affects younger women. Patients do very poorly when treated by locoregional therapy alone; therefore, pre-operative systemic therapy (PST) is commonly used.Materials and methods:Medical records of 64 Saudi patients with LABC treated with PST in a single institution were retrospectively reviewed.Results:At diagnosis, most patients were young (median age 41 years), and had poor clinicopathological characteristics. Following surgery, complete pathologic response (pCR) in the breast was achieved in 13 patients (20%). Of 62 patients with known nodal status, 22 (34%) had negative axillary nodes. Presence of oestrogen receptor (ER) negative tumour was the only dependent variable that predicted pCR in the breast (p = 0.03). At a median follow-up of 42 months, the median progression-free survival (PFS) was 48 months (95% CI, 20–76 months) and the projected five-year overall survival (OS) was 68%. The recently published scoring system (Jeruss et al (2008) J Clin Oncol 26 2 246–52), was the only variable that independently influenced PFS, while ER negative tumours and presence of lymphovascular space invasion were the only factors that adversely affected OS.Conclusions:despite the use of standard multi-modality approach in the management of patients with LABC, prognosis remains guarded.

Breast cancer knowledge and screening behaviors of female teachers

“…Breast cancer is the second commonest cause of cancer-related deaths in Saudi Arabia and the commonest type of female cancer. [ 3 4 5 ] In Saudi Arabia, the incidence rate of breast cancer was 1% according to the Saudi Cancer Registry (2001–2008). [ 6 ] 29.7% was the incidence of breast cancer among females in 2018.…”

Knowledge, and Screening Behaviours of Saudi Female Teachers Towards Breast Cancer in Description Buraydah, Saudi Arabia

“…Breast cancer is the second commonest cause of cancer-related deaths in Saudi Arabia and the commonest type of female cancer [3][4][5] . In Saudi Arabia, the incidence rate of breast cancer was 1% according to the Saudi Cancer Registry (2001)(2002)(2003)(2004)(2005)(2006)(2007)(2008) 6 , and the overall survival rate was lower than those reported in United Kingdom and United States of America 7 ; mostly this attributed to due to the non-existence of a standard nationwide breast screening program in the kingdom and low uptake of screening 8 .…”