ISSN: 1837-9664Journal of Cancer
Global reach, higher impact
J Cancer 2020; 11(9):2509-2517. doi:10.7150/jca.38976 This issue Cite
Research Paper
Decision-making of Adjuvant Chemotherapy for Breast Cancer Patients with Discordant Risk Classifications between Clinical-Pathological Factors and 21-gene Recurrence Score
1. Comprehensive Breast Health Center, Ruijin Hospital, Shanghai Jiaotong University School of Medicine, Shanghai 200025, China
2. Department of clinical laboratory, Ruijin Hospital, Shanghai Jiaotong University School of Medicine, Shanghai 200025, China
3. Department of pathology, Ruijin Hospital, Shanghai Jiaotong University School of Medicine, Shanghai 200025, China
Abstract
Background: Clinical-pathological factors and 21-gene recurrence score (RS) influence adjuvant chemotherapy (ACT) decision for early breast cancer patients. We investigated the decision-making of ACT in patients with discordant risk classifications of clinical-pathological factors and RS.
Methods: Patients with hormonal receptor (HR)+/ human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)-, early breast cancer, who underwent 21-gene RS testing were identified from Ruijin Hospital (RJBC) and the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database. According to Adjuvant! Online and RS (≤25 or >25), discordant risk classifications were defined as: clinical low-risk/ RS high-risk (C-low/ RS-high) and clinical high-risk/ RS low-risk (C-high/RS-low). McNemar's test was used to assess the changes between pre- and post-RS recommendations. Breast cancer-specific survival (BCSS) was estimated using the Kaplan-Meier methods.
Results: Among 727 RJBC patients, the C-low/RS-high group and the C-high/RS-low group represented 19.7% and 21.3% of the cohort. After receiving 21-gene RS results, treatment recommendations were changed for 22.1% patients with discordant risk classifications: ACT rate increased from 41.9% to 75.5% in the C-low/RS-high group and decreased from 63.9% to 60.0% in the C-high/RS-low group. Among 2958 patients from the SEER cohort, 18.4% of the C-high/RS-low group and 59.2% of the C-low/RS-high group received ACT. There was no significant difference in the estimated 3-year BCSS between ACT or not among the C-low/RS-high group (p=0.708) and the C-high/RS-low groups (p=0.391).
Conclusion: For patients with discordant risk classifications, physicians were apt to adopt the 21-gene RS rather than routine clinical-pathological factors to guide ACT selection.
Keywords: breast cancer, Adjuvant! Online, 21-gene recurrence score, discordant risk, adjuvant chemotherapy
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