Ivana Sestak, PhD, on Clinical Treatment Score From TAILORx: Predicting Distant Breast Cancer Recurrence
2019 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium
Ivana Sestak, PhD, of Queen Mary University of London and the Centre for Cancer Prevention, discusses study findings that confirm the prognostic ability of the Clinical Treatment Score at 5 years (CTS5) for late distant recurrence, specifically for patients older than 50 years and/or for those deemed to have intermediate- or high-risk hormone receptor–positive, HER2-negative, node-negative breast cancer. The CTS5 is less prognostic in women younger than 50 who received 5 years of endocrine therapy alone (Abstract GS4-03).
Rowan T. Chlebowski, MD, PhD, of the Lundquist Institute at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, discusses the long-term influence of using estrogen plus progestin or estrogen alone on breast cancer incidence and mortality (Abstract GS5-00).
Belinda Kingston, MB ChB, of the Institute of Cancer Research London, discusses next-generation sequencing results from the plasmaMATCH trial, including the incidence of gene alterations overall, as well as the associations with clinical and pathologic features that may help direct treatment decisions (Abstract GS3-07).
Joseph Sparano, MD, of the Montefiore Medical Center, discusses three challenges:
- How can gene-expression profiles and other diagnostic tests be used to guide the use of adjuvant systemic therapy?
- Is it time to reappraise active surveillance?
- Are there diagnostic and therapeutic strategies that can identify tumors at highest risk of metastasis, and novel therapies that can block the spread of disease?
Marie-Jeanne T.F.D. Vrancken Peeters, MD, PhD, of the Netherlands Cancer Institute, discusses an interim study analysis showing that ultrasound-guided core biopsies of the breast in patients with excellent response on MRI after neoadjuvant systemic therapy may not be accurate enough to safely select patients with pathologic complete response for omission of surgery (Abstract GS5-06).
Javier Cortes, MD, PhD, of the IOB Institute of Oncology, discusses study findings that suggested pembrolizumab offered a prolonged survival benefit compared to chemotherapy for a subset of patients with previously treated metastatic triple-negative breast cancer. In the trial, high tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes were significantly associated with better clinical outcomes with the checkpoint inhibitor.
