Systemic Treatment of Early Breast Cancer by Hormonal, Cytotoxic, or Immune Therapy:133 Randomised Trials involoving 31 000 Recurrences and 24 000 Deaths Among 75 000 Women (Summary)

Abstract

In a worldwide collaboration, information was sought and centrally checked on mortality and recurrence for each woman in any randomised trial that began before 1985 of any aspect of systemic adjuvant therapy for early breast cancer. Checked data were available for 75 000 women (about 90% of those ever randomised), of whom 32% had died and another 10% had experienced recurrence. The parts now reviewed include 30000 women in tamoxifen trials, 3000 in ovarian ablation trials, 11000 in polychemotherapy trials, 15000 in other chemotherapy comparisons, and 6000 in immunotherapy trials.

This contribution represents the summary and Figs. 3, 8, and 12 of an article originally published in Lancet (1992) 339: 1–15, 11–85. The authors gratefully acknowledge the permission to reprint it here.