Combined modality treatment of local regionally advanced breast cancer patients. 5 to 10 year follow-up

Local regionally advanced breast cancer carries a poor prognosis overall. There is little published information regarding the long-term follow-up of such patients prospectively treated with surgery, radiation therapy, and early systemic therapy. This communication reports 5-10 year follow-up results on 32 women with local regionally advanced breast cancer prospectively treated with initial surgery followed by systemic chemotherapy and irradiation therapy. Median relapse-free and overall survivals in these women were 37.6 and 62 months, respectively. Nine patients (28%) are currently alive and disease-free 5 to 10 years after diagnosis. Women with inflammatory breast cancer fared as well as other patients with local regionally advanced breast cancer in this small trial. None of 10 patients with gross disease after an initial mastectomy is disease-free as opposed to 9 of 22 women with initially resectable disease (41%). Thus, an appreciable minority of women with resectable local regionally advanced breast cancer may have prolonged disease-free survivals following combined modality therapy.