Marisa Weiss, MD
Carlos Arteaga, MD
Kathryn Ruddy, MD
COMMENTING ON THIS STUDY, Marisa Weiss, MD, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Breastcancer.org, said: “It is great to see a compliance rate of 80% at 2 years. When you talk to a patient about extending adjuvant therapy for 2 years instead of 5 extra years, it may be this will encourage women to opt for 2 years because it is not as overwhelming.”
“This is a negative study with positive news,” said press conference moderator Carlos Arteaga, MD, Director of the Harold C. Simmons Comprehensive Cancer Center at The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas.
“For many years, we have treated too many people for too long. De-escalation of therapy is a trend for HER2-positive and estrogen receptor–positive breast cancers. We don’t need another randomized trial to prove we are not depriving patients with only 7 years of adjuvant endocrine therapy,” Dr. Arteaga continued. “This study was well controlled and had no limitations I could see. It’s possible that patients with small tumors and low-grade cancers may not need extended adjuvant hormonal therapy,” he said.
Kathryn Ruddy, MD, of Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota, also commented on this study. “This is encouraging for women who want to stop aromatase inhibitor therapy after 7 years of endocrine therapy. Seven years appears to be adequate for most women, and this will reduce the risk of fractures we see with 10 years of extended aromatase inhibitor therapy,” she said. ■
DISCLOSURE: Drs. Weiss, Arteaga, and Ruddy reported no conflicts of interest.
