ASCO 2018: TAILORx Shows Most Women With Early-Stage Breast Cancer Can Avoid Chemotherapy
Posted: Monday, June 4, 2018
Adjuvant endocrine therapy is not inferior to chemoendocrine therapy for certain women with breast cancer, according to new findings presented by Joseph A. Sparano, MD, of the Montefiore Medical Center, the Bronx, New York, and colleagues at the 2018 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Annual Meeting in Chicago (Abstract LBA1). The results of the TAILORx phase III trial were demonstrated in women with hormone receptor–positive, HER2-negative, axillary node–negative breast cancer with mid-range (11 to 25) Oncotype DX Recurrence Scores (RS).
“Our study shows that chemotherapy may be avoided in about 70% of these women when its use is guided by the test, thus limiting chemotherapy to the 30% who we can predict will benefit from it,” said Dr. Sparano in an ASCO press release.
In the study, 10,253 women between the ages of 18 and 75 were enrolled. They had hormone receptor–positive, HER2-negative, axillary node–negative breast cancer, and tumors ranged from 1.1 to 5.0 cm. Of these total patients, 6,711 (65.5%) had an RS between 11 and 25 (intermediate risk); they were randomized to receive either endocrine therapy or chemoendocrine therapy.
After a median follow-up of 90 months, 836 invasive disease–free survival events were reported. Endocrine therapy was noninferior to chemoendocrine therapy for invasive disease–free interval (hazard ratio, 1.08) in the intention-to-treat population. Endocrine therapy was also found to be noninferior in terms of distant recurrence–free interval (hazard ratio, 1.03), recurrence-free interval (hazard ratio, 1.12), and overall survival (hazard ratio, 0.97). The research team found similar rates for endocrine and chemoendocrine therapies in terms of invasive disease–free interval (83.3% vs. 84.3%), distant recurrence–free interval (94.5% vs. 95.0%), recurrence-free interval (92.2% vs. 92.9%), and overall survival (93.9% vs. 93.8%), respectively.
