ASBrS 2020: Is Age Associated With the Presentation of Aggressive Breast Cancer?
Posted: Thursday, May 28, 2020
Kelly Krupa, MD, of the Allegheny General Hospital, Pittsburgh, and colleagues aggregated data to examine age-related breast cancer characteristics. The results of the analysis, which were presented during the 2020 Virtual Scientific Session Official Proceedings of the American Society of Breast Surgeons (ASBrS; Abstract 787537) and published in the Annals of Surgical Oncology, revealed that younger patients may present with aggressive disease at higher rates than their older counterparts.
“Understanding tumor biology and optimizing therapeutic interventions…are critical to improving outcomes,” Dr. Krupa commented in an ASBrS press release. “These unique features suggest [that the patient population younger than age 40] should be treated as its own entity,” the investigators proposed.
Using data from the National Cancer Database from 2010 through 2014, the investigators identified 26,262 patients younger than age 40 and 28,537 patients 40 years of age or older. All 54,799 patients had a known HER2 receptor status.
Patient age appeared to be associated with the presenting stage of breast cancer (P < .0001). The investigators noted that, overall, younger patients presented with a higher American Joint Committee on Cancer pathologic stage than their older counterparts (36.8% vs. 55.1% at stage 1, 43.3% vs. 32.4% at stage 2, 16.2% vs. 10.1% at stage 3, and 3.7% vs. 2.4% at stage 4). Younger patients also had a significantly greater chance of presenting with a grade II (odds ratio = 1.95), III (odds ratio = 4.55), or IV (odds ratio = 5.72) tumor than a well-differentiated tumor. According to the investigators, more younger patients were diagnosed with HER2-positive tumors (22.7% vs. 13.5%) and estrogen receptor–negative tumors (26.9% vs. 15.2%) than older patients. Women younger than age 40 were also more likely to receive an aggressive chemotherapy regimen (P < .0001); however, they did not appear to be at an increased risk of mortality.
Disclosure: The study authors reported no conflicts of interest.
2020 Virtual Annual Meeting of the American Society of Breast Surgeons
