Weekly doses of epirubicin in locally advanced breast cancer patients as neoadjuvant chemotherapy

Abstract

Weekly epirubicin 40 mg/m2 was administered as neoadjuvant chemotherapy to 54 patients with locally advanced breast carcinoma. Median age was 49 years with a range 24-65. Thirty-five patients were premenopausal and 19 postmenopausal. Tumor response was evaluated after six weeks of treatment with clinical examination and mammography. In case of objective response, treatment was completed to 9 weeks. Eight of 54 (15%) patients had CR; 34 (63%) had PR and overall response rate was 78%. Epirubicin was applied for 9 weeks as neoadjuvant therapy and was followed by modified radical mastectomy. After surgery epirubicin was given. This was followed by radiation therapy and an additional 4 weeks of epirubicin treatment. A total of nineteen patients were excluded from the study, these patients included 12 patients with no response to initial chemotherapy, 6 patients who refused surgery, radio- or chemotherapy and one patient with cardiotoxicity. Thirty-five patients completed the treatment schedule. Seven of 35 patients died with disease progression. Eighteen patients are still- alive with no evidence of disease. Two patients had locoregional recurrence and 15 had distant metastases. DFS at 3 years was 55% with a median of 39 months (range 6-48+ months), the median of the overall survival was not reached. No death due to toxicity occurred. [Turk J Cancer 1997;27(1):58-65]