Influence of patient and tumor characteristics on therapy persistence with letrozole in postmenopausal women with advanced breast cancer: results of the prospective observational EvAluate-TM study.

BACKGROUND: Treatment of postmenopausal, hormone receptor-positive metastatic breast cancer (MBC) patients varies despite clear therapy guidelines, favoring endocrine treatment (ET). Aim of this study was to analyze persistence of palliative aromatase inhibitor (AI) monotherapy in MBC patients. METHODS: EvAluate-TM is a prospective, multicenter, noninterventional study to evaluate treatment with letrozole in postmenopausal women with hormone receptor-positive breast cancer. To assess therapy persistence, defined as the time from therapy start to the end of the therapy (TTEOT), two pre-specified study visits took place after 6 and 12 months. Competing risk survival analyses were performed to identify patient and tumor characteristics that predict TTEOT. RESULTS: Out of 200 patients, 66 patients terminated treatment prematurely, 26 (13%) of them due to causes other than disease progression. Persistence rate for reasons other than progression at 12 months was 77.7%. Persistence was lower in patients who reported any adverse event (AE) in the first 30 days of ET (89.5% with no AE and 56% with AE). Furthermore, patients had a lower persistence if they reported compliance problems in the past before letrozole treatment. CONCLUSIONS: Despite suffering from a life-threatening disease, AEs of an AI will result in a relevant number of treatment terminations that are not related to progression. Some subgroups of patients have very low persistence rates. Especially with regard to novel endocrine combination therapies, these data imply that some groups of patients will need special attention to guide them through the therapy process. TRIAL REGISTRATION: Clinical Trials Number: CFEM345DDE19.

Effect of adjuvant bisphosphonates on disease-free survival in early breast cancer: Retrospective analysis results in an unselected single-center cohort.

Bisphosphonates are the gold standard for preventing skeletal-related events in patients with bone-metastatic cancer and have been investigated for reducing cancer treatment-induced bone loss. Evidence suggests bisphosphonates also offer anticancer benefits in adjuvant and advanced cancer settings. We conducted a retrospective analysis of data from a single-center, unselected cohort of women with early breast cancer (N=1646: 962 received adjuvant bisphosphonates, 684 did not) to assess the impact of bisphosphonates on disease-free and overall survival. The bisphosphonate group comprised all women who started bisphosphonate treatment within 1 year of breast cancer diagnosis and received ≥3 months of bisphosphonate treatment (zoledronic acid, clodronate, ibandronate, or alendronate; majority received zoledronic acid). Disease-free survival was defined as the time from breast cancer diagnosis until first disease recurrence or death. Treatment groups were balanced for cancer stage, hormone receptor expression, and human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 expression. Patients in the no-bisphosphonate group were more likely to be ≥75 years of age, node-negative, and have histologic grade 3 tumors. In patients treated with adjuvant bisphosphonates, disease-free survival was significantly longer than in those who did not receive bisphosphonates (P=0.0017). Both disease-free and overall survival were significantly longer in patients with hormone receptor-positive disease irrespective of lymph node status (disease-free survival: P=0.0038; overall survival: P<0.0026). No significant disease-free survival difference was detected in patients with hormone receptor-negative disease. This large, retrospective study demonstrates a significant survival benefit with adjuvant bisphosphonates in patients with early breast cancer, particularly in patients with node-positive and hormone receptor-positive disease.