Treatment of patients with stage I triple-negative breast cancer in Japan

According to the treatment guidelines of the Japan Society for Breast Cancer, clinical treatment with anti-cancer drugs and radiation therapy are given to patients with stage I triple negative Breast Cancer. The treatment results (distant metastasis rate, overall survival rate) of the anti-cancer drugs after the surgery are almost the same as those of the anti-cancer drugs before the surgery. In recent treatments for breast cancer, clinical treatment with anti-cancer drugs is performed on many cases before surgery in order to determine the effect of anti-cancer drugs treatment and shrink the breast cancer tissue.

From Japan Society for Breast Cancer, recurrence time of triple-negative breast cancer, has been reported to be two to three years after surgery.

If a treatment with anti-cancer drugs after surgery for the triple-negative breast cancer does not performed, 10-year relapse-free survival rate of 58.5%, a result of 10-year survival rate of 61.9% is shown in the report from the Japan Society for Breast Cancer. That is, if the treatment with anti-cancer agents has not been performed after surgery, breast cancer recurrence is observed in 30-40% of all patients with triple negative breast cancer.

According to the treatment guidelines of the Japan Society for Breast Cancer, the main clinical therapy for triple-negative breast cancer is treatment with anti-cancer drugs. The 5-year recurrence-free survival rate in patients whose breast cancer has completely treated after clinical treatment with anti-cancer drugs is approximately 90%. On the other hand, the 5-year recurrence-free survival rate in patients whose breast cancer has incompletely treated after clinical treatment with anti-cancer drugs is 50% or less.

According to the results of a clinical trial conducted jointly by Japan and South Korea in 2017, it was shown that the 5-year recurrence-free survival rate was 69.8% and the 5-year survival rate was 78.8% for patients treated with oral anti-cancer drugs for 6 months before surgery compared to patients not treated with oral anti-cancer drugs.

In the future, atezolizumab (immune checkpoint inhibitor), olaparib (PARP inhibitor), etc. may be additionally approved by the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare to prevent the recurrence of breast cancer.　Doctor specializing in cancer treatment                                                      JAMA Network Open Published on November by Kyoto@Takuma H