Jack Cuzick, PhD, of Queen Mary University of London, discusses the substantially greater benefits of anastrozole as compared with tamoxifen in terms of preventing breast cancer, with no increase in fractures or other reported serious side effects (Abstract GS4-04).
Madeleine M.A. Tilanus-Linthorst, MD, PhD, of Erasmus University, reports data from the first randomized trial comparing MRI breast cancer screening with mammography in women with a familial risk. Because MRI screening detected cancer at an earlier stage, it might reduce the use of adjuvant chemotherapy and decrease breast cancer–related mortality (Abstract GS4-07).
Gerardo Antonio Umanzor Funez, MD, of Liga Contra El Cáncer, discusses phase III findings on intravenous (IV) paclitaxel and oral paclitaxel plus encequidar (a novel P-gp inhibitor), the first orally administered taxane regimen shown to be superior to the IV formulation in terms of response and survival with less neuropathy (Abstract GS6-01).
Tari A. King, MD, of Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Dana-Farber/ Brigham and Women’s Cancer Center, discusses retrospective findings from the AURORA U.S. Network on molecular differences between primary tumors and metastases, a better understanding of which may help lead to more effective treatment of metastatic breast cancer (Abstract GS3-08).
Nadine M. Tung, MD, of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, discusses cisplatin vs doxorubicin/cyclophosphamide (AC) as neoadjuvant treatment in BRCA-mutation carriers with HER2-negative breast cancer. Although cisplatin as a single agent shows activity in this setting, the pathologic complete response with this agent alone is not higher than that with standard AC chemotherapy (Abstract GS6-03).
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.
