
Consider Race Prior to Neoadjuvant Breast Cancer Chemotherapy, Oncologists Recommend
A new study suggests that a poor response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy-frequently administered to black, Hispanic, and Asian women-could dictate survival rates in breast cancer.
Disparities in cancer have been a subject of research for a while. According to the
Published in the
“Even when we controlled for the fact that minority women often present with more advanced-stage, higher-grade tumors, and more aggressive types of breast cancer overall, our team was surprised to find that black women did not respond as well to neoadjuvant chemotherapy compared to other racial groups,”
The analysis showed that while 33% (5944) of women had a pathologic complete response (independent of hormonal receptor status), the rate of response was much worse among the black women in the cohort compared with the white women (37% vs 43% for triple-negative tumors, P<.001; (43% vs 54% for HER2-positive tumors, P = .001). The authors write that the difference endured variations in age, clinical stage, geographic region, insurance status, and median income and education. Overall, the results suggest that black women have a lower likelihood of pCR for triple-negative and HER2-positive breast cancer, either due to biological differences in chemosensitivity or socioeconomic differences, they conclude.
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