New England Journal of Medicine 2015-01-29

Perfecting breast-cancer treatment--incremental gains and musculoskeletal pains.

Dawn L Hershman

Index: N. Engl. J. Med. 372(5) , 477-8, (2015)

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Abstract

A fundamental feature of adjuvant therapy (treatment of apparently disease-free people to reduce the risk of recurrence) is that many are treated to benefit a few. The options for the adjuvant treatment of hormone-sensitive breast cancer have expanded in recent years. On the basis of meta-analyses of individual-patient data in studies dating back to 1985, tamoxifen has remained the standard of care in breast cancer. Tamoxifen reduces the annual rates of breast-cancer recurrence by almost half and mortality by one third. In absolute terms, this translates to 11.8 fewer recurrences and 9.2 fewer deaths per 100 women at 15 years. . . .