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Purpose: Breast cancer is a primary cause of cancer-related death among women worldwide. Neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NACT) is a cornerstone treatment for locally advanced, non-metastatic breast cancer. Achieving pathological complete response (pCR) is often used as a surrogate marker for long-term outcomes. This study examines the impact of obesity, defined by a body mass index (BMI) over 30 kg/m 2 , on achieving pCR in patients with early stage breast cancer (eBC) undergoing NACT., Methods: A retrospective analysis was conducted on patients with eBC treated with NACT at the University of Tübingen. The primary objective was to assess the impact of obesity on achieving pCR. Logistic regression analysis was used to determine the association between pre-treatment BMI and pCR, adjusting for covariates such as age, tumor stage, grading, and chemotherapy intensity., Results: The study included 325 patients, with 24% classified as obese. While the univariate logistic regression analysis showed no significant impact of obesity on the odds ratio of achieving pCR, the multivariate analysis, accounting for covariates, demonstrated that obese patients had a significantly higher likelihood of achieving pCR., Conclusion: In this retrospective study, obesity significantly affected the likelihood of achieving pCR in patients with eBC cancer undergoing NACT after adjusting for covariates. While obesity is a known risk factor for breast cancer development and progression, its impact on the efficacy of NACT in terms of achieving pCR was positive in our study. These findings contribute to the ongoing debate in the literature, though the retrospective design and potential uncontrolled factors should be considered., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

Aim: The Ovarian Cancer Retrospective European (O'CaRE) study assessed the cumulative impact of high-risk factors on progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) following first-line treatment in patients diagnosed with advanced ovarian cancer. Patients & methods: Medical records were collected from five European countries (2014 and 2015). Patients were grouped by number of high-risk factors: stage IV diagnosis, no known BRCA mutation , interval debulking surgery or no surgery, or visible residual disease. Results: Our analysis included 405 patients grouped based on having one (20.4%); two (32.3%); three (33.7%) or four (11.9%) high-risk factors. Increasing cumulative numbers of high-risk factors were associated with numerically shorter PFS and OS. Conclusion: Risk profiles should be carefully considered when planning clinical care.

Introduction: The third-generation antibody-drug conjugates (ADC), trastuzumab deruxtecan (T-DXd) and sacituzumab govitecan (SG), recently obtained approval for metastatic breast cancer treatment across various subtypes and therapeutic contexts., Materials and Methods: This retrospective, multicentric study evaluated real-world tolerability, feasibility and efficacy in a pre-treated, real-world cohort at three major German breast cancer centers., Results: 125 patients treated with T-DXd or SG from November 2020 to June 2023 were included (T-DXd: 77 patients; SG: 48 patients). The median treatment duration was 6.0 months for T-DXd and 3.5 months for SG therapy, with a median follow-up duration of 10.4 months for T-DXd (95% CI: 8.4-11.6) and 11.8 months for SG (95% CI: 8.0-14.4). Severe neutropenia (CTC ≥ III°) occurred in 33.3% during SG therapy, with a numerical reduction observed following primary, prophylactic use of G-CSF. T-DXd-associated pneumonitis occurred in 8 out of 77 patients (10.4 %). Median progression-free survival (mPFS) was 8.6 months (95% CI: 5.8-12.4) with T-DXd (HER2+: 10.8; HER2-low: 4.7) and 4.9 months (95% CI: 2.8-6.3) with SG (TNBC 4.9; HR+/HER2-: not reached). Median overall survival (OS) was 23.8 months (95% CI: 16.1-not estimable) with T-DXd (HER2+: 27.1; HER2-low: not reached), and 12.4 months (95% CI: 8.7-not estimable) with SG therapy (TNBC: 12.4, HR+/HER2-: not reached). 95.7% of the protocol-specified, therapeutic dose was administered for T-DXd and 89.6% for SG., Conclusion: Overall, this indicates good feasibility, tolerability, and effectiveness of ADC therapies in the real-world setting., Competing Interests: Conflict of Interest H. Schäffler: Travel Support by Daiichi Sankyo and Gilead, Honoraria by Novartis; D. Jakob: none; S. Huesmann: none; K. Pfister: Honoraria by Pfizer Novartis and Gilead; K. Veselinovic: Honoraria by Roche, Pfizer, AstraZeneca; F. Schochter: Travel Support, Honoraria and Consulting Fees by AstraZeneca, Roche, Karyopharm, Merck, GlaxoSmithKline, Eisai, Clovis; E. Leinert: none; V. Fink: none; B. Rack: Honoraria and research funding by AstraZeneca and Novartis; A. Englisch: none; L. Volmer: none; T. Engler: Travel Support, Honoraria and Consulting Fees by AstraZeneca, GSK, Gilead, Novartis, Lilly, Pfizer, MSD, Pierre Fabre, Stemline, Roche, Daiichi Sankyo; ML. Frevert: Honoraria by Novartis; I. Juhasz-Böss: none; S. Brucker: Travel Support and Consulting Fees by Hologic, Sanofi, AstraZeneca, Lilly, MSD, Medtronic, Pfizer; S. Heublein: research funding and honoraria from Clovis Oncology, Inc., GlaxoSmithKline, Novartis, Roche, AstraZeneca and Pfizer. Participation in advisory boards for Novartis, GlaxoSmithKline, and Merck Sharp & Dohme Corporation; W. Janni: Travel Support, Honoraria and Consulting Fees by Daiichi Sankyo, AstraZeneca, Gilead; FA. Taran: Travel Support by Gilead, Consulting Fees by AstraZeneca, Gilead, MSD, ImmunoGen, Onkowissen, Roche, GSK; A. Hartkopf: Travel Support by Daiichi Sankyo, Gilead, Roche, AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Honoraria by Daiichi Sankyo, Gilead, Seagen, Roche, AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Lilly, MSD, Novartis; D. Dannehl: Travel Support by Gilead and Daiichi Sankyo, Honoraria by Gilead., (The Author(s). This is an open access article published by Thieme under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonDerivative-NonCommercial-License, permitting copying and reproduction so long as the original work is given appropriate credit. Contents may not be used for commercial purposes, or adapted, remixed, transformed or built upon. (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).)

Background The preparation of multidisciplinary team (MDT) meetings can be time-consuming. In addition to the clinical data being available digitally in subsystems, the preparation of more complex cases requires literature research. Several expert systems have been developed to support this process. However, the interaction with these systems has to be trained. Current development enables linguistic interaction with such artificial intelligence (AI) systems. To the best of our knowledge, these have not been tested as premedical screening tools for MDT. Methods This is a retrospective consecutive case series of 10 cervical cancer cases comparing the medical recommendations of the MDT and artificial intelligence (AI) on a low level (i.e., surgery, systemic treatment, and radiotherapy). Results The clinical cases ranged from primary diagnosis via suspected recurrence to palliative settings. The AI repeatedly stated that medical professionals need to be consulted before treatment decisions. The AI answers ranged from no agreement to overachievement by mentioning treatment options for preexisting risk factors (such as obesity). In standard cases, the AI answer matched well with the expert recommendations. In some cases, the AI answers were contrary to our treatment recommendation. Conclusion The interaction with current language AIs is temptingly easy, and the replies are very understandable. Despite the AI warning regarding medical recommendations in the majority of our cases, there was a good match with the MDT recommendations. However, in some cases, the medical evidence behind the answers was missing or in the worst case fictional. In our case series, the AI did not meet the requirements to support a clinical MDT meeting by prescreening the therapeutic options. However, it did exceed the expectations regarding the risk factors of the patients., Competing Interests: Human subjects: Consent was obtained or waived by all participants in this study. Animal subjects: All authors have confirmed that this study did not involve animal subjects or tissue. Conflicts of interest: In compliance with the ICMJE uniform disclosure form, all authors declare the following: Payment/services info: All authors have declared that no financial support was received from any organization for the submitted work. Financial relationships: All authors have declared that they have no financial relationships at present or within the previous three years with any organizations that might have an interest in the submitted work. Other relationships: All authors have declared that there are no other relationships or activities that could appear to have influenced the submitted work., (Copyright © 2024, Ebner et al.)

BRAWO, a real-world study, assessed the efficacy, quality of life (QoL) and safety of EVE + EXE in postmenopausal women with HR+/HER2- advanced breast cancer (ABC) in routine clinical practice. Postmenopausal women with HR+/HER2-ABC with recurrence or progression after a NSAI were included. Primary Observation parameters included the evaluation of the effectiveness of EVE + EXE. A multivariate-analysis using Cox proportional hazard model was built to identify predictors of progression. Overall, 2100 patients were enrolled (August 2012-December 2017); 2074 were evaluable for efficacy and safety analyses. Majority of patients (60.6%) received EVE + EXE as first (28.7%) or second-line (31.9%) therapy. Visceral metastases were present in 54.1% patients. Median progression-free survival (mPFS) reported as 6.6 months (95%CI: 6.3-7.0). Multivariate-analysis in a subset of patients (n = 1837) found higher body mass index (BMI) and non-visceral metastases to be independent predictors of favorable PFS. Patients with a BMI of 20 to <25 had a mPFS of 6.0 (95%CI: 5.4-6.4) and those with a BMI ≥30 had mPFS of 8.5 (95%CI: 6.9-9.9). 41.2% patients achieved stable disease and 7.3% partial response. No major changes were observed QoL; 86.4% patients received stomatitis prophylaxis and 41.4% experienced EVE related AEs of stomatitis, mainly low grade. AEs occurred in 91.2% of patients, of which stomatitis (42.6%) and fatigue (19.8%) were most frequent. The BRAWO study provides real-world evidence of efficacy and safety of EVE + EXE in patients with HR+, HER2- ABC. A high BMI and the absence of visceral metastases were independent predictors of PFS in this cohort of patients., (© 2024 UICC.)

The Breast Committee of the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Gynäkologische Onkologie (German Gynecological Oncology Group, AGO) presents the 2024 update of the evidence-based recommendations for the diagnosis and treatment of patients with locally advanced and metastatic breast cancer., Competing Interests: Prof. Dr. med. Marc Thill was a member of advisory board Agendia, Amgen, AstraZeneca, Aurikamed, Becton/Dickinson, Biom‘Up, ClearCut, Clovis, Daiichi Sankyo, Eisai, Exact Sciences, Gilead Science, Grünenthal, GSK, Lilly, MSD, Neodynamics, Novartis, Onkowissen, Organon, Pfizer, pfm medical, Pierre Fabre, Roche, RTI Surgical, Seagen, Sirius Medical, and Sysmex; received manuscript support from Amgen, ClearCut, Clovis, Organon, pfm medical, Roche, and Servier; received travel expenses from Amgen, Art Tempi, AstraZeneca, Clearcut, Clovis, Connect Medica, Daiichi Sankyo, Eisai, Exact Sciences, Gilead, Hexal, I-Med-Institute, Lilly, MCI, MSD, Neodynamics, Novartis, Pfizer, pfm medical, Roche, RTI Surgical, and Seagen; received congress support from Amgen, AstraZeneca, Celgene, Daiichi Sanyko, Gilead, Hexal, Lilly, Neodynamics, Novartis, Pfizer, Pierre Fabre, Roche, and Sirius Medical; has received lecture honoraria from Amgen, Art Tempi, AstraZeneca, Clovis, Connect Medica, Eisai, Exact Sciences, Gedeon Richter, Gilead Science, GSK, Hexal, I-Med-Institute, Jörg Eickeler, Laborarztpraxis Walther et al. Lilly, MCI, Medscape, MSD, Medtronic, Novartis, Onkowissen, Pfizer, pfm medical, Roche, Seagen, StreamedUp, Stemline, Sysmex, Vifor, Viatris, and ZP Therapeutics; has received trial funding from Endomag, Exact Sciences; and received trial honoraria (institutional) from AstraZeneca, Biom’Up, Cairn Surgical, Celgene, Clearcut, Neodynamics, Novartis, pfm medical, Roche, and RTI Surgical. Prof. Dr. med. Wolfgang Janni has received research grants and/or honoraria from AstraZeneca, Celgene, Chugai, Daiichi Sankyo, Eisai, ExactScience, GSK, Janssen, Lilly, Menarini, MSD, Novartis, Sanofi Aventis, Roche, Pfizer, Seagen, Gilead, Inivata, and Guardant Health. Prof. Dr. med. Ute-Susann Albert has received lectures from Pfizer, Novartis, AstraZeneca, was a member of advisory board Daiichi Sankyo, and Pfizer. Prof. Dr. Malgorzata Banys-Paluchowski has received honoraria for lectures and advisory from Roche, Novartis, Pfizer, pfm, Eli Lilly, Onkowissen, Seagen, AstraZeneca, Eisai, Amgen, Stemline, Samsung, Canon, MSD, GSK, Daiichi Sankyo, Gilead, Sirius Medical, Syantra, Pierre Fabre, and ExactSciences; received study support from EndoMag, Mammotome, MeritMedical, Gilead, Hologic, and ExactSciences; and received travel/congress support from Eli Lilly, ExactSciences, Pierre Fabre, Pfizer, AstraZeneca, Daiichi Sankyo, and Roche. Dr. med. Ingo Bauerfeind has received honoraria and travel reimbursement from Brustkrebs Deutschland e.V., Krankenhaus Kempten, Akademie für Psychoonkologie, IF-Kongress Management. Prof. Dr. med. Jens-Uwe Blohmer has received honoraria for advisory boards and lectures from Astra Zeneca, Daiichi Sankyo, Eisai, Gilead, Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer, Roche, and Seagen. Prof. Dr. med. Wilfried Budach has received honoraria for lectures and advisory boards from Merck, BMS, Jörg Eickeler Veranstaltungen, medpublico GmbH, and BVDST. Prof. Dr. med. Peter Dall has received honoraria for lectures and advisory boards from Novartis, Pierre Fabré, MSD, Lilly, and AstraZeneca. Prof. Dr. Nina Ditsch was a member of advisory boards and speakers bureaus AstraZeneca, Aurikamed, BGGF, Daiichi Sankyo, Elsevier Verlag, ESO, Exact Sciences, Gilead Sciences, GSK, if-Kongress, KelCon, Leopoldina Schweinfurt, Lilly, Lukon, Molekular Health, MSD, Novartis, onkowissen, Pfizer, RG-Ärztefortbildungen, Roche, and Seagen. Prof. Dr. med. Eva Maria Fallenberg has received research grant from DFG and speaker honorarium from GE Healthcare, Bayer Healthcare, Guerbet, Siemens, BD, Roche, EUSOBI, ESOR, ESMO, and B-Rayz. Prof. Dr. med. Peter A. Fasching participate on a data safety monitoring board or advisory board: Novartis, Pfizer, Roche, Daiichi Sankyo, AstraZeneca, Lilly, Eisai, Merck Sharp and Dohme, Pierre Fabre, SeaGen, Agendia, Sanofi Aventis, Gilead, and Mylan; has received honoraria for lecture, speakers bureaus, manuscript writing, or educational events from Novartis, Pfizer, Roche, Daiichi Sankyo, AstraZeneca, Lilly, Eisai, Merck Sharp and Dohme, Pierre Fabre, SeaGen, Agendia, Sanofi Aventis, Gilead, and Mylan; and has received consulting from Novartis, Pfizer, Roche, Daiichi Sankyo, AstraZeneca, Lilly, Eisai, Merck Sharp and Dohme, Pierre Fabre, SeaGen, Agendia, Sanofi Aventis, Gilead, and Mylan. Medical Writing: Merck, to institution: Biontech, Cepheid, Pfizer. Prof. Dr. med. Tanja N. Fehm has receiverd honoraria from Onkowissen. Prof. Dr. med. Michael Friedrich was a member of advisory board: Gilead Sciences has received other honoraria from Roche, MSD. Prof. Dr. med. Bernd Gerber has received travel support from Pfizer. PD Dr. med. Oleg Gluz has received honoraria for lectures and/or consulting from Amgen, AstraZeneca, Daiichi Sanyko, Eisai, Gilead Science, Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer, Roche, Seagen, Exact Sciences, Agendia, MedConcept, and GynUpdate, Minority share holder: Westdeutsche Studiengruppe (WSG). Prof. Nadia Harbeck, MD has received honoraria for lectures and/or consulting from AstraZeneca, Daiichi Sankyo, Gilead, Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Pierre Fabre, Pfizer, Roche, Seagen, Viatris, and Zuelligpharma; received other from Co-Director West German Study Group (WSG). Prof. Dr. med. Andreas Daniel Hartkopf has received honoraria for consulting and speaking engagements from AstraZeneca, Agendia, Amgen, Clovis, Daichi Sankyo, Eisai, ExactScience, Gilead, GSK, Hexal, Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Onkowissen, Pfizer, Roche, Pierre Fabre, Seagen, Stemline, and Verazyte. Prof. Dr. med. Jens Huober has received honoraria for lectures from Lilly, Novartis, Roche, Pfizer, AstraZeneca, MSD, Seagen, Gilead, and Daiichi; has received honoraria for consulting/advisory board from Lilly, Novartis, Roche, Pfizer, AstraZeneca, MSD, Daiichi, and Gilead; and has received travel grants from Roche, Pfizer, Daiichi, and Gilead. Prof. Dr. med. Christian Jackisch was a member of advisory board Astra Zeneca, Novartis, Lilly, Gilead, Exact Sciences, Pfizer, Roche, GSK, Pierre Fabre, Roche, and Seagen and received lecture from Art tempi, AstraZeneca, Lilly, Novartis, Roche, Amgen, Pierre Fabre, Exact Sciences, MSD, GynUpdate, and StreamedUp. Prof. Dr. med. Cornelia Kolberg-Liedtke was a member of advisory board: SeaGen, Exact Sciences, Pfizer, Novartis, AstraZeneca, Lilly, SeaGen, Daiichi Sankyo, Agendia, Gilead, and Onkowissen; has received lecture from NOGGO, CECOG, PINK, Pfizer, Roche, AstraZeneca, Carl Zeiss Meditec, Lilly, SeaGen, and Daiichi Sankyo; received other honoraria from Gilead Science and POMME; and stockholding Theraclion SA. Prof. Dr. med. Hans-Heinrich Kreipe was a member of advisory board: Lilly; has received lecture from AstraZeneca, Roche, Daiichi Sankyo, and Pfizer. PD Dr. David Krug has received lecture from Merck Sharp and Dohme, Pfizer, Astra Zeneca, onkowissen, med update; was a member of advisory board: Gilead; and has received research funding from Merch KGaA and Deutsche Krebshilfe. Prof. Dr.med. Thorsten Kühn was a member of advisory board/lecture Sysmex, Neodynamics, Pfizer, MSD, Merit Medical, Sirius Medical, Hologic, Endomag, Lilly; and has received trial funding from Merit Medical, Endomag, Mammotome. Prof. Dr. med. Sherko Kümmel has received lecture from Roche, Lilly, Exact Sciences, Novartis, Amgen, Daiichi Sankyo, AstraZeneca, MSD, Pfizer, Seagen, Gilead, Agendia; Hologic, PINK!, and Stemline; has received other honoraria from Roche, Daiichi Sankyo, and Sonoscape; was a member of advisory board Lilly, MSD, Roche, Astra Zeneca, Stemline, Novartis, Daiichi Sankyo, MSD, Seagen, Gilead, and Exact Science. Prof. Dr. med. Sibylle Loibl was a member of advisory board, institutional: Abbvie, Amgen, AstraZeneca, BMS, Celgene, DSI, Eirgenix, GSK, Gilead Science, Lilly, Novartis, Olema, Pfizer, Pierre Fabre, Relay Therapeuticas, Puma, Roche, Seagen, and Stemline-Menarini; invited speaker, personal: Medscape; and has received trial funding/others from Astra Zeneca, Abbvie, Celgene, Daiichi Sankyo, Greenwich Life Sciences, GSK, Immunomedics/Gilead, Molecular Health, Novartis, Pfizer, Roche, Stemline-Menarini, and VM Scope GmbH. Prof. Dr. med. Diana Lüftner D.L. has received honoraria for advisory board activities and/or oral presentations from Amgen, AstraZeneca, Daiichi Sankyo, Eli Lilly, Gilead, GSK, high5md, Loreal, MSD, Mundipharma, Novartis, onkowissen.de, Pfizer, Pierre Fabre, Roche, and TEVA. Prof. Dr. med. Michael Patrick Lux M.P.L. has received honoraria from Lilly, Pfizer, Roche, MSD, Hexal, Novartis, AstraZeneca, Eisai, Exact Sciences, Agendia, Daiichi Sankyo, Grünenthal, Gilead, Pierre Fabre, PharmaMar, Samantree, Endomag, and medac for advisory boards, lectures, and travel support. Prof. Dr. med. Nicolai Maass was a member of advisory board Amgen, AstraZeneca, Clovis, Daiichi Sankyo, GSK, Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Pierre Fabre, Pfizer, Roche, and Seagen has received lecture from Astra Zeneca, Daiichi Sankyo, GSK, Lilly, Novartis, Pfizer, and Roche. Prof. Dr. med. Christoph Mundhenke was a member of advisory board AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Daiichi Sankyo, Seagen, and Novartis and has received lecture from Pfizer and Novartis. Prof. Dr. med. Toralf Reimer has received trial funding from German Cancer Aid and Else Kroener-Fresenius-Stiftungwas a member of advisory board MSD, Novartis, and Myriad; and has received lecture from Pfizer, Novartis, Roche, and AstraZeneca. Prof. Dr. med. Kerstin Rhiem has received honoraria from AstraZeneca, Roche, Novartis, streamed up. Prof. Dr. med. Achim Rody was a member of advisory board AstraZeneca, Novartis, Roche, Exact Sciences, Pierre Fabre, Lilly, Seagen, Amgen, MSD, Gilead; has received lecture from Pfizer, Celgene, Eisai; and has received trial funding from Eisai. Prof. Dr. med. Marcus Schmidt M.S. reports personal fees from AstraZeneca, BioNTech, Daiichi Sankyo, Eisai, GILEAD, Lilly, Menarini-Stemline, Molecular Health, MSD, Novartis, Pantarhei Bioscience, Pfizer, Pierre Fabre, Roche, and SeaGen, His institution has received research funding from AstraZeneca, BioNTech, Eisai, Genentech, German Breast Group, Novartis, Palleos, Pantarhei Bioscience, Pierre Fabre, and SeaGen. In addition, he has a patent for EP 2390370 B1 and a patent for EP 2951317 B1 issued. Prof. Dr. med. Andreas Schneeweiss has received research grants from Celgene, Roche; has received honoraria from Amgen, AstraZeneca, Aurikamed, Bayer, Celgene, ClinSol, Clovis Oncology, coma UroGyn, Connectmedica, Daiichi Sankyo, Gilead, GSK, if-kongress, I-MED, iOMEDICO, Lilly, MCI Deutschland, med publico, Metaplan, MSD, Mylan, NanoString Technologies, Novartis, onkowissen.de, Pfizer, Pierre Fabre, promedicis, Roche, Seagen, streamedup, and Tesaro; and has received travel support from AstraZeneca, Celgene, Daiichi Sankyo, Gilead, Pfizer, and Roche. Prof. Dr. med. Florian Schütz has received lecture from Amgen, AstraZeneca, Daiichi Sankyo, Eisai, ExactSciences, Gilead, Lilly, MSD, Novartis, ClinSol, Pfizer, and Roche Pharma; was a member of advisory board Lilly, MSD, Gilead, Atheneum Partners, and ClinSol; and received travel expenses from Lilly, Gilead. Prof. Dr. med. Hans-Peter Sinn was a member of advisory board Astra Zeneca, Exact Sciences, and Daiichi Sankyo; has received lecture from AstraZeneca and Diacentus; and has received trial funding from AstraZeneca. Prof. Dr. med. Christine Solbach has received lecture from DiaLog Service GmbH, Jörg Eickeler, Pfizer, Roche, AstraZeneca, MedConcept, I-Med, GBG, BVF Akademie, and LÄK Hessen Akademie was a member of advisory board: MSD, Roche. Prof. Dr. med. Erich Solomeyer has received honoraria from Roche, Amgen, Celgen, Tesaro, Astra Zeneca, Pfizer, Storz, Erbe, Gedeon Richter, Eisai, Medac, MSD, Vifor, Teva, Ethikon, Johnson Johnson, Daiichi Sankyo, Gilead, Exact Sciences, GSK, and Pierre Fabre. Prof. Dr. med. Elmar Stickeler was a member of advisory boards Amgen, Astra Zeneca, Gilead, Iomedico, Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Seagen, and Roche and received lecture from Astra Zeneca, BSH Düsseldorf, Gilead, Iomedico, MSD, Novartis, Onkowissen, Pfizer, PharmaMar, and Roche. Prof. Dr. med. Christoph Thomssen has received compensation for advisory boards, lectures or publications from Amgen, AstraZeneca, Aurikamed, Daiichi Sankyo, Forum Sanitas, Gilead, Jörg Eickeler, Hexal, Lilly, Medupdate, MSD, Nanostring, Novartis, Onkowissen, Pfizer, Roche, Seagen, Vifor. Prof. Dr. med. Michael Untch M. U. has received honoraria to travel support, lectures, and consulting or advisory role from AstraZeneca, Amgen, Daiichi Sankyo, Lilly, Roche, Pfizer, MSD Oncology, Pierre Fabre, Sanofi Aventis, Myriad, Seagen, Novartis, Gilead, Stemline, Genzyme, Agendia, Onkowissen, and Eisai, all honoraria and fees to the employer/institution. Prof. Dr. Isabell Witzel has received lecture from Astra Zeneca, Lilly, Seagen, Daiichi Sankyo, Gilead, Pfizer and Novartis, and Onkowissen and has received Travel support from Roche and Lilly. Prof. Dr. med. Achim Wöckel has received compensation for advisory boards, lectures, trial funding advisory board from Amgen, AstraZeneca, Aurikamed, Celgene, Eisai, Lilly, Novartis, Pfizer, Roche, Tesaro, Sirtex, MSD, Exact Sciences, Pierre Fabre, Clovis, Organon, Daiji Sankyo, Seagen, Stemline, and Gilead. PD. Dr. Rachel Würstlein served as advisor, consultant, speaker, and travel grant Agendia, Amgen, Apogepha, Aristo, Astra Zeneca, Celgene, Clovis Oncology, Daiichi Sankyo, Eisai, Esteve, Exact Sciences, Gilead, Glaxo Smith Kline, Hexal, Lilly, Medstrom Medical, MSD, Mundipharma, Mylan, Nanostring, Novartis, Odonate, Paxman, Palleos, Pfizer, Pierre Fabre, PINK, PumaBiotechnolgogy, Riemser, Roche, Sandoz/Hexal, Sanofi Genzyme, Seattle Genetics/Seagen, Sidekick, Stemline, Tesaro Bio, Teva, Veracyte, Viatris, Wiley, FOMF, Aurikamed, Clinsol, Pomme Med, medconcept, MCI, and MediSeminar. Prof. Dr. med. Volkmar Müller has received speaker honoraria Astra Zeneca, Daiichi Sankyo, Eisai, Pfizer, MSD, Medac, Novartis, Roche, Seagen, Onkowissen, high5 Oncology, Medscape, Gilead, Pierre Fabre, and i-MED Institute; has received consultancy honoraria from Roche, Pierre Fabre, PINK, ClinSol, Novartis, MSD, Daiichi Sankyo, Eisai, Lilly, Seagen, Gilead, and Stemline; has received institutional research support from Novartis, Roche, Seagen, Genentech, and Astra Zeneca; and has received travel grants from Astra Zeneca, Roche, Pfizer, Daiichi Sankyo, and Gilead. Prof. Dr. Tjoung-Won Park-Simon has received honoraria for lectures and/or consulting from Roche, AstraZeneca, GSK, Pfizer, Lilly, MSD, Exact Sciences, Daiichi Sankyo, Seagen, Novartis, Gilead Science, NCO, Onkowissen, Exact Sciences, and Seagen and has received travel compensation from Roche, AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Lilly, Daiichi Sankyo, Gilead, and Pierre Fabre. Prof. Dr. med. Jörg Heil has none to declare., (© 2024 S. Karger AG, Basel.)

Background: Fifteen to thirty percent of all patients with metastatic breast cancer (MBC) develop brain metastases (BCBMs). Recently, the antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs) sacituzumab govitecan (SG) and trastuzumab deruxtecan (T-DXd) have shown to be highly effective in the treatment of MBC. However, there are only limited data whether these macromolecules are also effective in patients with BCBMs. We therefore aimed to examine the efficacy of SG and T-DXd in patients with stable and active BCBMs in a multicenter real-world analysis., Patients and Methods: Female patients with stable or active BCBMs who were treated with either SG or T-DXd at three breast centers in Germany before 30 June 2023 were included. As per local clinical praxis, chemotherapy efficacy was evaluated by whole-body computed tomography and cranial magnetic resonance imaging at baseline and at least every 3 months according to local standards. Growth dynamics of BCBMs were assessed by board-certified neuroradiologists., Results: Of 26 patients, with a median of 2.5 prior therapy lines in the metastatic setting (range 2-15), 12 (43%) and 16 (57%) patients received SG and T-DXd, respectively. Out of the 12 patients who received SG, 2 (17%) were subsequently treated with T-DXd. Five out of 12 (42%) and 5 out of 16 (31%) patients treated with SG and T-DXd, respectively, had active BCBMs at treatment initiation. The intracranial disease control rate was 42% [95% confidence interval (CI) 13% to 71%] for patients treated with SG and 88% (95% CI 72% to 100%) for patients treated with T-DXd. After a median follow-up of 12.7 months, median intracranial progression-free survival was 2.7 months (95% CI 1.6-10.5 months) for SG and 11.2 months (95% CI 7.5-23.7 months) for T-DXd., Conclusions: SG and T-DXd showed promising clinical activity in both stable and active BCBMs. Further prospective clinical studies designed to investigate the efficacy of modern ADCs on active and stable BCBMs are urgently needed., (Copyright © 2024 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.)

Background: In MONALEESA-2, addition of ribociclib to letrozole resulted in significantly longer progression-free survival (PFS) in postmenopausal women with HR+HER2- advanced breast cancer (ABC). RIBociclib for the treatment of advanCed breast CAncer (RIBECCA) study investigated ribociclib plus letrozole in a patient population reflecting routine clinical practice., Patients and Methods: In this multicenter, open-label, single-arm, phase 3b study, patients with HR+HER2- ABC not amenable to curative therapy and ECOG performance status ≤ 2 received ribociclib plus letrozole (cohort A: postmenopausal women and men in first-line; cohort B: pre-/perimenopausal women in first-line [B1], patients pretreated for advanced disease [B2]). The primary endpoint was clinical benefit rate (CBR) by week 24; secondary endpoints included overall response rate (ORR), PFS, overall survival (OS), and safety. Association of patient and tumor characteristics with PFS was analyzed by multivariable Cox regression analysis., Results: Overall, 487 patients were evaluable for efficacy, 502 for safety. By week 24, CBR was 60.8 % (95 % CI, 56.3-65.1), ORR was 19.3 % (95 % CI, 15.9-23.1). Median PFS was 21.8 months (95 % CI, 13.9-25.3) in first-line postmenopausal patients and 11.0 months (95 % CI, 8.2-16.4) in premenopausal and pretreated patients. Median OS was not reached. Higher baseline ECOG performance status, higher histological grade, and negative progesterone receptor status showed an unfavorable effect on PFS. Most common adverse events were neutropenia (50.0 %), nausea (42.0 %), and fatigue (39.2 %)., Conclusion: In this broad population of patients with HR+HER2- ABC, efficacy and safety results of ribociclib plus letrozole were similar to those observed in pivotal trials., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests: Peter A. Fasching reports personal fees from Novartis, grants from Biontech, grants and personal fees from Pfizer, personal fees from Daiichi-Sankyo, personal fees from Astra Zeneca, personal fees from Eisai, personal fees from Merck Sharp & Dohme, grants from Cepheid, personal fees from Lilly, personal fees from Pierre Fabre, personal fees from SeaGen, personal fees from Roche, personal fees from Hexal, personal fees from Agendia, personal fees from Sanofi Aventis, personal fees from Gilead, during the conduct of the study. Thomas Decker reports being on advisory board with Novartis, Lilly. Andreas Hartkopf reports consulting fees from Novartis, Pfizer, Lilly, MSD, AstraZeneca, Roche, Seattle Genetics, ExactSiences; honoraria from Novartis, Pfizer, Lilly, MSD, AstraZeneca, Roche; travel expenses from Roche, Pfizer, AstraZeneca; grants or contracts from ExactSiences; writing Support from Novartis. Arnd Nusch has no conflict of interest to disclose. Bernhard J. Heinrich has received documentation fees from Novartis. Christian M. Kurbacher received grants or contracts from Astra Zeneca, BMS, Eli Lilly, Immunomedics, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer, Riemser, Roche, Seattle Genetics; consulting fees from Amgen, Eli Lilly, Novartis, Pfizer, Riemser, Roche, GSK, Servier; honoraria from Amgen, Astra Zeneca, Clovis Oncology, Eli Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer, Roche, GSK; support for attending meetings and/or travel from Amgen, AstraZeneca, Immunomedics, Pfizer, TEVA Oncology; has been on advisory board with Amgen, Astra Zeneca, Eli Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer, Onkotrakt, PharmaMar, Riemser, Roche, GSK; has been on board of directors (unpaid) in Berufsverband niedergelassener gynäkologischer Onkologen in Deutschland e. V.(BNGO). Roswitha Fuchs has no conflict of interest to disclose. Hans Tesch has received consulting fees from Pierre Fabre, Pfizer Pharma, Mundipharma, ClinSol, Novartis, Lilly, Grünenthal, Vifor, AstraZeneca, Mylan, Amgen; honoraria from Vifor, Novartis, AstraZeneca, ClinSol, MundiPharma, Lilly, Amgen; travel expenses from Pierre Fabre, Pfizer, Mundipharma, ClinSol, Novartis, Lilly, Grünenthal, Vifor, AstraZeneca, Mylan, Amgen; has been on advisory board with Novartis, BMS, Molecular Health GmbH, AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Roche, Grünenthal, Mylan; has been in leadership or fiduciary role in Arbeitskreis KlinischeStudien e.V., ASCO, BNHO, DGHO, DKG, ESMO, Deutsche Ges. für Senologie. Petra Krabisch has no conflict of interest to disclose. Jens Huober reports research funding from Celgene, Novartis, Hexal; honoraria from Lilly, Novartis, Roche, Pfizer, AstraZeneca, MSD, Celgene, Eisai, Abbvie; consulting/advisory relationship with Lilly, Novartis, Roche, Pfizer, Hexal, AstraZeneca, MSD, Celgene, Abbvie; travel expenses from Roche, Pfizer, Novartis, Celgene, Daiichi. Sherko Kuemmel reports receiving consulting fees from Lilly, pfm medical, Somatex, MSD; honoraria from Roche, Genomic Health, Novartis, Amgen, Celgene, Daiichi Sankyo, AstraZeneca, Pfizer; travel expenses from Roche, Daiichi Sankyo, Lilly, Sonoscape; advisory board with Roche, Daiichi Sankyo, Lilly, MSD, AstraZeneca, Pfizer; leadership of fiduciary role in WSG (Co Director), AGO, NOGGOe.V, AGimed. Sara Y. Brucker reports receiving honoraria from Storz, Pfizer, Roche, Novartis, MSD, AstraZeneca; travel expenses from Storz, Pfizer, Roche, Novartis, MSD, AstraZeneca; advisory board with Storz, Pfizer, Roche, Novartis, MSD, AstraZeneca. Wolfgang Janni received grants or contracts from Novartis; consulting fees from Novartis; honoraria from Novartis; payment for expert testimony from Novartis; travel expenses from Novartis. Andreas Schneeweiss received writing support from Roche; grants or contracts from Celgene, Roche, AbbVie; consulting fees from Celgene, Pfizer, AstraZeneca, Novartis, MSD, Tesaro, Lilly; payment for expert testimony from Roche, AstraZeneca; travel expenses from Celgene, Roche, Pfizer. Martin Schuler reports receiving consultant fees from AstraZeneca, Boehringer Ingelheim, BMS, GSK, Janssen, Novartis, Roche, Takeda; honoraria from Amgen, Boehringer Ingelheim, BMS, Janssen, MSD, Novartis; research funding to institution from AstraZeneca, BMS. Tanja Fehm received honoraria from Roche, Novartis, Pfizer, Daiichi Sankyo, AstraZeneca, MSD, TEVA; travel expenses from Daiichi Sankyo, Roche; was on advisory board with Daiichi Sankyo, Roche, Pfizer., (Copyright © 2023 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.)

Background: The phenotypes of tumor cells change during disease progression, but invasive rebiopsies of metastatic lesions are not always feasible. Here we aimed to determine whether initially HER2-negative metastatic breast cancer (MBC) patients with HER2-positive circulating tumor cells (CTCs) benefit from a HER2-targeted therapy., Methods: The open-label, interventional randomized phase III clinical trial (EudraCT Number 2010-024238-46, CliniclTrials.gov Identifier: NCT01619111) recruited from March 2012 until September 2019 with a follow-up duration of 19.5 months. It was a multicenter clinical trial with 94 participating German study centers. A total of 2137 patients with HER2-negative MBC were screened for HER2-positive CTCs with a final modified intention-to-treat population of 101 patients. Eligible patients were randomized to standard therapy with or without lapatinib. Primary study endpoints included CTC clearance (no CTCs at the end of treatment) and secondary endpoints were progression-free survival, overall survival (OS), and safety., Results: In both treatment arms CTC clearance at first follow-up visit-although not being significantly different for both arms at any time point-was significantly associated with improved OS (42.4 vs 14.1 months; P = 0.002). Patients treated additionally with lapatinib had a significantly improved OS over patients receiving standard treatment (20.5 vs 9.1 months, P = 0.009)., Conclusions: DETECT III is the first clinical study indicating that phenotyping of CTCs might have clinical utility for stratification of MBC cancer patients to HER2-targeting therapies. The OS benefit could be related to lapatinib, but further studies are required to prove this clinical observation. ClinicalTrials.gov Registration Number: NCT01619111., (© Association for Diagnostics & Laboratory Medicine 2024. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.)

Competing Interests: W. Janni: no conflict of interest to declare. M. Banys-Paluchowski: Honoraria for lectures and participation in advisory boards: Roche, Novartis, Pfizer, pfm, Eli Lilly, onkowissen, Seagen, AstraZeneca, Eisai, Amgen, Samsung, Canon, MSD, GSK, Daiichi Sankyo, Gilead, Sirius Medical, Syantra, Resitu, Pierre Fabre, Exact Sciences. Study support from: Endomag, Mammotome, Merit Medical, Sirius Medical, Gilead, Hologic, Exact Sciences. Travel reimbursement: Eli Lilly, Exact Sciences, Pierre Fabre, Pfizer, Daiichi Sankyo, Roche. F.C. Bidard: consulting or advisory board: Pfizer; AstraZeneca; Lilly; Novartis; Menarini; Sanofi; GSK; Rain Oncology; Caris Life Sciences; GE Healthcare; Exact Sciences; Gilead. Speaker’s bureau: Pfizer; Novartis; AstraZeneca; Roche; Lilly; Rain Oncology; Daiichi Sankyo; Menarini-Stemline. Research funding: Novartis; Pfizer; Menarini Silicon Biosystems; ProLynx; Merck KGaA; GE Healthcare. C. Thomssen: no conflict of interest to declare.

Background: As the available information about breast cancer is growing every day, the decision-making process for the therapy is getting more complex. ChatGPT as a transformer-based language model possesses the ability to write scientific articles and pass medical exams. But is it able to support the multidisciplinary tumor board (MDT) in the planning of the therapy of patients with breast cancer?, Material and Methods: We performed a pilot study on 10 consecutive cases of breast cancer patients discussed in MDT at our department in January 2023. Included were patients with a primary diagnosis of early breast cancer. The recommendation of MDT was compared with the recommendation of the ChatGPT for particular patients and the clinical score of the agreement was calculated., Results: Results showed that ChatGPT provided mostly general answers regarding chemotherapy, breast surgery, radiation therapy, chemotherapy, and antibody therapy. It was able to identify risk factors for hereditary breast cancer and point out the elderly patient indicated for chemotherapy to evaluate the cost/benefit effect. ChatGPT wrongly identified the patient with Her2 1 + and 2 + (FISH negative) as in need of therapy with an antibody and called endocrine therapy "hormonal treatment"., Conclusions: Support of artificial intelligence by finding individualized and personalized therapy for our patients in the time of rapidly expanding amount of information is looking for the ways in the clinical routine. ChatGPT has the potential to find its spot in clinical medicine, but the current version is not able to provide specific recommendations for the therapy of patients with primary breast cancer., (© 2023. The Author(s).)

Despite tremendous progress in deciphering breast cancer at the genomic level, the pronounced intra- and intertumoral heterogeneity remains a major obstacle to the advancement of novel and more effective treatment approaches. Frequent treatment failure and the development of treatment resistance highlight the need for patient-derived tumor models that reflect the individual tumors of breast cancer patients and allow a comprehensive analyses and parallel functional validation of individualized and therapeutically targetable vulnerabilities in protein signal transduction pathways. Here, we introduce the generation and application of breast cancer patient-derived 3D microtumors (BC-PDMs). Residual fresh tumor tissue specimens were collected from n = 102 patients diagnosed with breast cancer and subjected to BC-PDM isolation. BC-PDMs retained histopathological characteristics, and extracellular matrix (ECM) components together with key protein signaling pathway signatures of the corresponding primary tumor tissue. Accordingly, BC-PDMs reflect the inter- and intratumoral heterogeneity of breast cancer and its key signal transduction properties. DigiWest®-based protein expression profiling of identified treatment responder and non-responder BC-PDMs enabled the identification of potential resistance and sensitivity markers of individual drug treatments, including markers previously associated with treatment response and yet undescribed proteins. The combination of individualized drug testing with comprehensive protein profiling analyses of BC-PDMs may provide a valuable complement for personalized treatment stratification and response prediction for breast cancer., (© 2023. Italian National Cancer Institute ‘Regina Elena’.)

Importance: Combination of chemotherapy with (dual) ERBB2 blockade is considered standard in hormone receptor (HR)-positive/ERBB2-positive early breast cancer (EBC). Despite some promising data on endocrine therapy (ET) combination with dual ERBB2 blockade in HR-positive/ERBB2-positive BC, to our knowledge, no prospective comparison of neoadjuvant chemotherapy vs ET plus ERBB2 blockade in particular with focus on molecular markers has yet been performed., Objective: To determine whether neoadjuvant de-escalated chemotherapy is superior to endocrine therapy, both in combination with pertuzumab and trastuzumab, in a highly heterogeneous HR-positive/ERBB2-positive EBC., Design, Setting, and Participants: This prospective, multicenter, neoadjuvant randomized clinical trial allocated 207 patients with centrally confirmed estrogen receptor-positive and/or progesterone receptor-positive (>1%) HR-positive/ERBB2-positive EBC to 12 weeks of standard ET (n = 100) vs paclitaxel (n = 107) plus trastuzumab and pertuzumab. A total of 186 patients were required to detect a statistically significant difference in pathological complete response (pCR) (assumptions: 19% absolute difference in pCR; power, ≥80%; 1-sided Fisher exact test, 2.5% significance level)., Interventions: Standard ET (aromatase inhibitor or tamoxifen) or paclitaxel, 80 mg/m2, weekly plus trastuzumab and pertuzumab every 21 days., Main Outcomes and Measures: The primary end point was pCR (ypT0/is, ypN0). Secondary end points included safety, translational research, and health-related quality of life. Omission of further chemotherapy was allowed in patients with pCR. PAM50 analysis was performed on baseline tumor biopsies., Results: Of the 207 patients included (median [range] age, 53 [25-83] years), 121 (58%) had cT2 to cT4 tumors, and 58 (28%) had clinically node-positive EBC. The pCR rate in the ET plus trastuzumab and pertuzumab arm was 23.7% (95% CI, 15.7%-33.4%) vs 56.4% (95% CI, 46.2%-66.3%) in the paclitaxel plus trastuzumab and pertuzumab arm (odds ratio, 0.24; 95% CI, 0.12-0.46; P < .001). Both immunohistochemical ERBB2 score of 3 or higher and ERBB2-enriched subtype were independent predictors for pCR in both arms. Paclitaxel was superior to ET only in the first through third quartiles but not in the highest ERBB2 quartile by messenger RNA. In contrast with the paclitaxel plus trastuzumab and pertuzumab arm, no decrease in health-related quality of life after 12 weeks was observed in the ET plus trastuzumab and pertuzumab arm., Conclusions and Relevance: The WSG-TP-II randomized clinical trial is, to our knowledge, the first prospective trial comparing 2 neoadjuvant de-escalation treatments in HR-positive/ERBB2-positive EBC and demonstrated an excellent pCR rate after 12 weeks of paclitaxel plus trastuzumab and pertuzumab that was clearly superior to the pCR rate after ET plus trastuzumab and pertuzumab., Trial Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03272477.

Die diesjährige Frühjahrstagung der DGHO (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Hämatologie und Medizinische Onkologie e. V.) stand unter der Überschrift «Herausforderungen in der Onkologie - personalisierte Therapiesteuerung». Über drei Themenkomplexe hinweg wurden aktuelle Möglichkeiten und Perspektiven der Therapiesteuerung in der Onkologie hinsichtlich «Methoden», gelungenen «Beispielen» sowie der «Umsetzung in der Versorgung» diskutiert., (© 2023 S. Karger AG, Basel.)

Background: Sequencing of tumour tissue with comprehensive gene panels is increasingly used to guide treatment in precision oncology. Analysis of tumour-normal pairs allows in contrast to tumour-only assessment direct discrimination between somatic and germline alterations, which might have important implications not only for the patients but also their families., Methods: We performed tumour normal sequencing with a large gene panel in 1048 patients with advanced cancer to support treatment decision. Sequencing results were correlated with clinical and family data., Results: We identified 156 likely pathogenic or pathogenic (LP/P) germline variants in cancer predisposition genes (CPGs) in 144 cases (13.7%). Of all patients, 8.8% had a LP/P variant in autosomal-dominant cancer predisposition genes (AD-CPGs), most of them being genes with high or moderate penetrance (ATM, BRCA2, CHEK2 and BRCA1). In 48 cases, the P/LP variant matched the expected tumour spectrum. A second variant in tumour tissue was found in 31 patients with AD-CPG variants. Low frequency mutations in either TP53, ATM or DNMT3A in the normal sample indicated clonal haematopoiesis in five cases., Conclusions: Tumour-normal testing for personalised treatment identifies germline LP/P variants in a relevant proportion of patients with cancer. The majority of them would not have been referred to genetic counselling based on family history. Indirect functional readouts of tumour-normal sequencing can provide novel links between CPGs and unexpected cancers. The interpretation of increasingly complex datasets in precision oncology is challenging and concepts of interdisciplinary personalised cancer prevention are needed to support patients and their families., (Copyright © 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Purpose: Metabolites are in the spotlight of attention as promising novel breast cancer biomarkers. However, no study has been conducted concerning changes in the metabolomics profile of metastatic breast cancer patients according to previous therapy., Methods: We performed a retrospective, single-center, nonrandomized, partially blinded, treatment-based study. Metastatic breast cancer (MBC) patients were enrolled between 03/2010 and 09/2016 at the beginning of a new systemic therapy. The endogenous metabolites in the plasma samples were analyzed using the AbsoluteIDQ ® p180 Kit (Biocrates Life Sciences AG, Innsbruck) a targeted, quality and quantitative-controlled metabolomics approach. The statistical analysis was performed using R package, version 3.3.1. ANOVA was used to statistically assess age differences within groups. Furthermore, we analyzed the CTC status of the patients using the CellSearch ™ assay., Results: We included 178 patients in our study. Upon dividing the study population according to therapy before study inclusion, we found the following: 4 patients had received no therapy, 165 chemotherapy, and 135 anti-hormonal therapy, 30 with anti-Her2 therapy and 38 had received treatment with bevacizumab. Two metabolites were found to be significantly different, depending on the further therapy of the patients: methionine and serine. Whereas methionine levels were higher in the blood of patients who received an anti-Her2-therapy, serine was lower in patients with endocrine therapy only., Conclusion: We identified two metabolites for which concentrations differed significantly depending on previous therapies, which could help to choose the next therapy in patients who have already received numerous different treatments., (© 2022. The Author(s).)

In cancer, the complex interplay between tumor cells and the tumor microenvironment results in the modulation of signaling processes. By assessing the expression of a multitude of proteins and protein variants in cancer tissue, wide-ranging information on signaling pathway activation and the status of the immunological landscape is obtainable and may provide viable information on the treatment response. Archived breast cancer tissues from a cohort of 84 patients (no adjuvant therapy) were analyzed by high-throughput Western blotting, and the expression of 150 proteins covering central cancer pathways and immune cell markers was examined. By assessing CD8α, CD11c, CD16 and CD68 expression, immune cell infiltration was determined and revealed a strong correlation between event-free patient survival and the infiltration of immune cells. The presence of tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes was linked to the pronounced activation of the Jak/Stat signaling pathway and apoptotic processes. The elevated phosphorylation of PPARγ (pS112) in non-immune-infiltrated tumors suggests a novel immune evasion mechanism in breast cancer characterized by increased PPARγ phosphorylation. Multiplexed immune cell marker assessment and the protein profiling of tumor tissue provide functional signaling data facilitating breast cancer patient stratification., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflict of interest.

In light of the frequent development of therapeutic resistance in cancer treatment, there is a strong need for personalized model systems representing patient tumor heterogeneity, while enabling parallel drug testing and identification of appropriate treatment responses in individual patients. Using ovarian cancer as a prime example of a heterogeneous tumor disease, we developed a 3D preclinical tumor model comprised of patient-derived microtumors (PDM) and autologous tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) to identify individual treatment vulnerabilities and validate chemo-, immuno- and targeted therapy efficacies. Enzymatic digestion of primary ovarian cancer tissue and cultivation in defined serum-free media allowed rapid and efficient recovery of PDM, while preserving histopathological features of corresponding patient tumor tissue. Reverse-phase protein array (RPPA)-analyses of >110 total and phospho-proteins enabled the identification of patient-specific sensitivities to standard, platinum-based therapy and thereby the prediction of potential treatment-responders. Co-cultures of PDM and autologous TILs for individual efficacy testing of immune checkpoint inhibitor treatment demonstrated patient-specific enhancement of cytotoxic TIL activity by this therapeutic approach. Combining protein pathway analysis and drug efficacy testing of PDM enables drug mode-of-action analyses and therapeutic sensitivity prediction within a clinically relevant time frame after surgery. Follow-up studies in larger cohorts are currently under way to further evaluate the applicability of this platform to support clinical decision making.

Background: Anthracycline/cyclophosphamide-taxane-containing chemotherapy (AC-T) is the standard of care in the adjuvant treatment of HER2-negative early breast cancer (EBC), but recent studies suggest omission of anthracyclines for reduced toxicity without compromising efficacy., Methods: Based on individual patient data (n = 5924) pooled from the randomised Phase III trials PlanB and SUCCESS C, we compared disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) between intermediate to high-risk HER2-negative EBC-patients treated with either six cycles of docetaxel/cyclophosphamide (TC6) or an AC-T regime using univariable and adjusted multivariable Cox regression models., Results: AC-T conferred no significant DFS or OS advantage in univariable (DFS: hazard ratio (HR) for TC vs. AT 1.05, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.89-1.24, P = 0.57; OS: HR 1.00, 95% CI: 0.80-1.26, P = 1.00) and adjusted multivariable analysis (DFS: HR 1.01, 95% CI: 0.86-1.19, P = 0.91; OS: HR 0.97, 95% CI: 0.77-1.22, P = 0.79). Patients receiving TC6 had significantly fewer grade 3-4 adverse events. Exploratory subgroup analysis showed that AC-T was associated with significantly better DFS and OS in pN2/3 patients, specifically in those with lobular histology., Conclusion: For most patients with HER2-negative EBC, AC-T is not associated with a survival benefit compared to TC6. However, patients with lobular pN2/pN3 tumours seem to benefit from anthracycline-containing chemotherapy., (© 2022. The Author(s).)

Purpose: Since 2008, guidelines recommend that patients with HER2-positive early breast cancer (BC) should receive adjuvant chemotherapy in combination with trastuzumab in Germany. However, recent studies highlight that a substantial share of patients do not receive trastuzumab. We investigate which patient characteristics are associated with a tumor board recommendation for trastuzumab in Breast Cancer Centers (BCC) certified by the German Cancer Society (DKG) and the German Society for Senology, and if the recommendation differs between BCCs., Materials and Methods: Multi-level modeling was performed using quality assurance data based on 3052 HER2-positive, operated patients with a first diagnosis of early BC treated between 2006 and 2019 in 17 BCCs in Germany to investigate whether trastuzumab recommendation varies with patient sex, age, and disease characteristics, as well as over time and across BCCs., Results: Tumor board recommendations for trastuzumab differ substantially between BCCs (intraclass correlation coefficient [ICC] null model: 0.11). Our final model (ICC 0.17, Akaike Information Criterion [AIC], 1328.0, R 2 0.69) shows that physicians in BCCs more often recommend trastuzumab to patients who are younger than 60 years and those with a recommendation for any additional therapy (chemotherapy, radiation or endocrine therapy) (all p < 0.05). Furthermore, there is a significant time-dependent increase of trastuzumab recommendations (odds ratio [OR] = 1.38, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.31-1.46, p < 0.05)., Conclusion: In certified BCCs in Germany, guideline concordant trastuzumab recommendation is increasing since 2006 (positive cohort effect). Recommendation of trastuzumab for HER2-positive BC patients in BCCs is significantly associated with patients' age and the recommendations for other additional therapy strategies, apart from surgery. The quality assurance data analyzed do not include potentially relevant confounders, such as socioeconomic status or comorbidities., (© 2021. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

The shorter cervical segment after classic radical trachelectomy (RT) imposes a number of pregnancy associated risk factors. In this aspect, large conization (LC) could be an oncologically safe alternative to RT in young women with early stage cervical cancer who want to spare their fertility. Our aim was to evaluate fertility-sparing surgical treatment of early stage cervical cancer after the introduction of LC. Our objectives were to assess surgical, oncological, fertility and obstetric outcomes. We retrospectively investigated oncological and fertility outcomes of patients who underwent LC in a large oncological single University centre between 2009 and 2014. Medical records were reviewed and analysed for surgical, oncological, fertility and obstetric outcomes. Postal questionnaires were collected to further evaluate and validate the fertility and obstetric outcomes. A total of 23 LCs were analysed. Seven patients had to undergo secondary radical hysterectomy after LC due to unclear resection margins. Nine of 16 women tried to conceive, of which all nine became pregnant. Seven patients underwent a prophylactic cerclage between 13 and 16 gestational weeks and seven women delivered 9 children; the majority of women conceived spontaneously. Follow-up time was a median of 3.9 years (2.6-8 years). There was no relapse of cervical cancer in the investigated timeframe. Early stage cervical cancers treated by LC are associated with excellent oncological outcomes. LC appears to be a safe option for eligible women who intend to maintain their fertility., (© 2021. The Author(s).)

Background: One in eight women is diagnosed with breast cancer in the course of their life. As systematic palliative treatment has only a limited effect on survival rates, the concept of health-related quality of life (HRQoL) was developed for measurement of patient-centered outcomes. Various studies have already demonstrated the reliability of paper-based patient-reported outcome (pPRO) and electronic patient-reported outcome (ePRO) surveys and that the 2 means of assessment are equally valid., Objective: The aim of this study was to analyze the acceptance and evaluation of a tablet-based ePRO app for breast cancer patients and to examine its suitability, effort, and difficulty in the context of HRQoL and sociodemographic factors., Methods: Overall, 106 women with adjuvant or advanced breast cancer were included in a 2-center study at 2 major university hospitals in Germany. Patients were asked to answer HRQoL and PRO questionnaires both on a tablet on-site using a specific eHealth assessment website and on paper. The suitability, effort, and difficulty of the app and self-reported technical skills were also assessed. Only the results of the electronically acquired data are presented here. The results of the reliability of the pPRO data have already been published elsewhere., Results: Patients regarded the ePRO assessment as more suitable (80/106, 75.5%), less stressful (73/106, 68.9%), and less difficult (69/106, 65.1%) than pPRO. The majority of patients stated that ePRO assessment improves health care in hospitals (87/106, 82.1%). However, evaluation of ePROs depended on the level of education (P=.003) in the dimensions of effort and difficulty (regression analysis). The app was rated highly in all categories. HRQoL data and therapy setting did not show significant correlations with the app's evaluation parameters., Conclusions: The results indicate that ePRO surveys are feasible for measuring HRQoL in breast cancer patients and that those patients prefer ePRO assessment to pPRO assessment. It can also be seen that patients consider ePRO assessment to improve hospital health care. However, studies with larger numbers of patients are needed to develop apps that address the needs of patients with lower levels of education and technical skills., (©Joachim Graf, Nina Sickenberger, Katharina Brusniak, Lina Maria Matthies, Thomas M Deutsch, Elisabeth Simoes, Claudia Plappert, Lucia Keilmann, Andreas Hartkopf, Christina Barbara Walter, Markus Hahn, Tobias Engler, Stephanie Wallwiener, Florian Schuetz, Peter A Fasching, Andreas Schneeweiss, Sara Yvonne Brucker, Markus Wallwiener. Originally published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research (https://www.jmir.org), 08.02.2022.)

Preclinical data suggest that neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAT) may promote micrometastatic spread. We aimed to compare the detection rate and prognostic relevance of disseminated tumor cells (DTCs) from the bone marrow (BM) of patients with early-stage breast cancer (EBC) after NAT with that of therapy-naive EBC patients. DTCs were identified from BM samples, collected during primary surgery. Patients who received NAT were compared to patients who received chemotherapy after surgery. In total, 809 patients were analyzed. After NAT, 45.4% of patients were DTC-positive as compared to 19.9% of patients in the adjuvant chemotherapy group ( p < 0.001). When sampled in patients who had undergone NAT, the detection of DTCs in the BM was significantly increased (OR: 3.1; 95% confidence interval (CI): 2.1-4.4; p < 0.001). After NAT, DTC-positive patients with ≥2 DTCs per 1.5 × 10 6 mononuclear cells in their BM had an impaired disease-free survival (HR: 4.8, 95% CI: 0.9-26.6; p = 0.050) and overall survival (HR: 4.2; 95% CI: 1.4-12.7; p = 0.005). The higher rate of DTC-positive patients after NAT as compared to a treatment-naive comparable control cohort suggests that NAT supports tumor cell dissemination into the bone marrow. DTC positivity in BM predicted relapse in various distant organs, implying that tumor cell dissemination was not restricted to the bone marrow.

Background: Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) have been reported to predict clinical outcome in metastatic breast cancer (MBC). Biology of CTCs may differ from that of the primary tumor and HER2-positive CTCs are found in some patients with HER2-negative tumors., Patients and Methods: Patients with HER2-negative MBC were screened for participation in DETECT III and IV trials before the initiation of a new line of therapy. Blood samples were analyzed using CELLSEARCH. CTCs were labeled with an anti-HER2 antibody and classified according to staining intensity (negative, weak, moderate, or strong staining)., Results: Screening blood samples were analyzed in 1933 patients with HER2-negative MBC. As many as 1217 out of the 1933 screened patients (63.0%) had ≥1 CTC per 7.5 ml blood; ≥5 CTCs were detected in 735 patients (38.0%; range 1-35 078 CTCs, median 8 CTCs). HER2 status of CTCs was assessed in 1159 CTC-positive patients; ≥1 CTC with strong HER2 staining was found in 174 (15.0%) patients. The proportion of CTCs with strong HER2 staining among all CTCs of an individual patient ranged between 0.06% and 100% (mean 15.8%). Patients with estrogen receptor (ER)- and progesterone receptor (PR)-positive tumors were more likely to harbor ≥1 CTC with strong HER2 staining. CTC status was significantly associated with overall survival (OS). Detection of ≥1 CTC with strong HER2 staining was associated with shorter OS [9.7 (7.1-12.3) versus 16.5 (14.9-18.1) months in patients with CTCs with negative-to-moderate HER2 staining only, P = 0.013]. In multivariate analysis, age, ER status, PR status, Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance status, therapy line, and CTC status independently predicted OS., Conclusion: CTC detection in patients with HER2-negative disease is a strong prognostic factor. Presence of ≥1 CTC with strong HER2 staining was associated with shorter OS, supporting a biological role of HER2 expression on CTCs., Competing Interests: Disclosure VM received speaker honoraria from Amgen, Astra Zeneca, Daiichi-Sankyo, Eisai, GSK, Pfizer, MSD, Novartis, Roche, Teva, and Seagen; consultancy honoraria from Genomic Health, Hexal, Roche, Pierre Fabre, Amgen, Clin Sol, Novartis, MSD, Daiichi-Sankyo, Eisai, Lilly, and Seagen; institutional research support from Novartis, Roche, Seagen, and Genentech; travel grants from Roche, Pfizer, and Daiichi Sankyo. MBP received honoraria for lectures and advisory role from Novartis, Roche, Pfizer, Eli Lilly, Eisai, Daiichi Sankyo, GSK, AstraZeneca, pfm, and Amgen; and study support from Endomag, Mammotome and Merit Medical. PW has received research funding from Amgen, AstraZeneca, MSD, GlaxoSmithKline, Novartis, Pfizer, PharmaMar, Roche Pharma, Clovis, and Lilly; honoraria from Amgen, AstraZeneca, MSD, GlaxoSmithKline, Novartis, Pfizer, Roche Pharma, Clovis, TEVA, Eisai, and Lilly; serves on the advisory board of Amgen, AstraZeneca, MSD, GlaxoSmithKline, Novartis, Pfizer, Roche Pharma, Clovis, TEVA, Eisai, and Lilly. NH reports honoraria for consulting and/or lectures from Astra Zeneca, Daiichi-Sankyo, Exact Sciences, Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Pierre Fabre, Pfizer, Roche, Sandoz, and Seagen. JH received research funding from Celgene, Novartis, and Hexal; honoraria from Lilly, Novartis, Roche, Pfizer, AstraZeneca, MSD, Celgene, Eisai, and AbbVie; honoraria for consulting/advisory relationship from Lilly, Novartis, Roche, Pfizer, Hexal, AstraZeneca, MSD, Celgene, and AbbVie; and travel expenses from Roche, Pfizer, Novartis, Celgene, and Daiichi. TF reports honoraria from Novartis, unrelated to this work. OH received honoraria for advisory boards, lectures, and congress and travel expense support from Roche, Novartis, MSD, Pfizer, Astra Zeneca, Daiichi Sankyo, Riemser Pharma, Celgene, and Seagen. FMS reports consulting fees from Amgen. TF received consulting fees (e.g. advisory boards) from Amgen, Daiichi Sankyo, Roche, AstraZeneca, MSD Oncology, Novartis, Pierre Fabre, and Pfizer Teva, and fees for non-CME services received directly from commercial interest or their agents (e.g. speakers’ bureaus): Daiichi Sankyo, Roche, and Novartis. All other authors have declared no conflicts of interest., (Copyright © 2021 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.)

Background: Health-related quality of life (HRQoL) is used to evaluate the treatment of metastatic breast cancer. In a long-term therapy setting, HRQoL can be used as an important benchmark for treatment success. With the help of digital apps, HRQoL monitoring can be extended to more remote areas and be administered on a more frequent basis., Objective: This study aims to evaluate 3 common HRQoL questionnaires in metastasized breast cancer in terms of TTD in a digital, web-based setting. We further aim to examine the development of the HRQoL in different systemic treatment groups in each of these evaluation instruments., Methods: A total of 192 patients with metastatic breast cancer were analyzed in this bicentric prospective online cohort study at two German university hospitals. Patients completed questionnaires on HRQoL (EuroQol Visual Analog Scale [EQ-VAS], EuroQol 5 Dimension 5 Level [EQ-5D-5L], European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire-Core 30 item [EORTC QLQ-C30]) via an online platform over a 6-month period. Treatment schedules and medical history were retrieved from medical records. Unadjusted Cox regression analysis on treatment-related factors was performed. We conducted subgroup analyses in regard to TTD events between different treatments., Results: The EQ-VAS showed a higher rate of deterioration after 8 weeks (84/179, 46.9%) than the EQ-5D-5L (47/163, 28.8%) and EORTC QLQ-C30 (65/176, 36.9%). Unadjusted Cox regression revealed significant connections between known metastases in the liver (P=.03, HR 1.64, 95% CI 1.06-2.52) and pleura (P=.04, HR 0.42, 95% CI 0.18-0.96) in the EQ-VAS. Significant relations between EQ-VAS events and single EQ-5D-5L items and the EQ-5D-5L summary score were demonstrated. All treatment groups significantly differed from the CDK4/6 inhibition subgroup in the EQ-VAS., Conclusions: Compared to the EQ-5D-5L and QLQ-C30, the EQ-VAS showed a higher rate of deterioration after 8 weeks. Significant connections to certain metastatic locations were only detected in the EQ-VAS. The EQ-VAS is capable of reflecting the distinctive HRQoL profiles of different systemic treatments as well as the different aspects of HRQoL presented in the EQ-5D-5L. TTD with the EQ-VAS is an adequate mean of examining longitudinal development of HRQoL among breast cancer patients., (©Katharina Brusniak, Manuel Feisst, Linda Sebesteny, Andreas Hartkopf, Joachim Graf, Tobias Engler, Andreas Schneeweiss, Markus Wallwiener, Thomas Maximilian Deutsch. Originally published in JMIR Cancer (https://cancer.jmir.org), 12.10.2021.)

Background: The positive impact that physical activity has on patients with cancer has been shown in several studies over recent years. However, supervised physical activity programs have several limitations, including costs and availability. Therefore, our study proposes a novel approach for the implementation of a patient-executed, activity tracker-guided exercise program to bridge this gap., Objective: Our trial aims to investigate the impact that an activity tracker-guided, patient-executed exercise program for patients undergoing radiotherapy has on cancer-related fatigue, health-related quality of life, and preoperative health status., Methods: Patients receiving postoperative radiotherapy for breast cancer (OnkoFit I trial) or neoadjuvant, definitive, or postoperative treatment for other types of solid tumors (OnkoFit II trial) will be randomized (1:1:1) into 3-arm studies. Target accrual is 201 patients in each trial (50 patients per year). After providing informed consent, patients will be randomized into a standard care arm (arm A) or 1 of 2 interventional arms (arms B and C). Patients in arms B and C will wear an activity tracker and record their daily step count in a diary. Patients in arm C will receive personalized weekly targets for their physical activity. No further instructions will be given to patients in arm B. The target daily step goals for patients in arm C will be adjusted weekly and will be increased by 10% of the average daily step count of the past week until they reach a maximum of 6000 steps per day. Patients in arm A will not be provided with an activity tracker. The primary end point of the OnkoFit I trial is cancer-related fatigue at 3 months after the completion of radiotherapy. This will be measured by the Functional Assessment of Chronic Illness Therapy-Fatigue questionnaire. For the OnkoFit II trial, the primary end point is the overall quality of life, which will be assessed with the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-General sum score at 6 months after treatment to allow for recovery after possible surgery. In parallel, blood samples from before, during, and after treatment will be collected in order to assess inflammatory markers., Results: Recruitment for both trials started on August 1, 2020, and to date, 49 and 12 patients have been included in the OnkoFit I and OnkoFit II trials, respectively. Both trials were approved by the institutional review board prior to their initiation., Conclusions: The OnkoFit trials test an innovative, personalized approach for the implementation of an activity tracker-guided training program for patients with cancer during radiotherapy. The program requires only a limited amount of resources., Trial Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT04506476; https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04506476. ClinicalTrials.gov NCT04517019; https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04517019., International Registered Report Identifier (irrid): DERR1-10.2196/28524., (©Franziska Hauth, Barbara Gehler, Andreas Michael Nieß, Katharina Fischer, Andreas Toepell, Vanessa Heinrich, Inka Roesel, Andreas Peter, Mirjam Renovanz, Andreas Hartkopf, Andreas Stengel, Daniel Zips, Cihan Gani. Originally published in JMIR Research Protocols (https://www.researchprotocols.org), 22.09.2021.)

Purpose: Clip-marking of axillary lymph nodes with initial biopsy-confirmed metastasis is required for targeted axillary dissection (TAD), which includes sentinel lymph node dissection (SLND) and selective localization and removal of the clipped targeted lymph node. There have been several studies which examined the feasibility of TAD in routine clinical use. In this context, the optimal clip visualisation was noted as one of the crucial limiting factors. We, therefore, evaluated the sonographic detectability of 10 different commercially available markers within an in vitro model simulating the anatomical composition of the axilla., Methods: In this standardised model consisting of porcine fat with 30 mm thickness, the visibility of a total of ten markers was analysed in all 3 planes (parallel, diagonal, orthograde) with wire guidance and then classified into either "visibility good", "visibility moderate" or "visibility poor" with regard to the alignment of the transducer. Additionally, "real-life conditions" were simulated, in which the markers were searched without any wires guidance., Results: It was observed that, while not all markers are detectable in fatty tissue, markers with spherical shape (non-embedded Inconel or Nitinol) or rectangular-shaped Titanium markers with embedded material have a clear advantage. 3D-shaped markers can always be detected in all three axes, which is of particular importance in the axilla with its pyramid shape and fatty tissue., Conclusion: The shape and the embedding of the material play a crucial role for visibility and efficacy of the marker, as reliable marking of suspicious and pathological axillary lymph nodes is essential for TAD., (© 2021. The Author(s).)

Background: Liquid Biopsy (LB) in the form of e.g., circulating tumor cells (CTCs) is a promising non-invasive approach to support current therapeutic cancer management. However, the proof of clinical utility of CTCs in informing therapeutic decision-making for e.g., breast cancer in clinical trials and associated translational research projects is facing the issues of low CTC positivity rates and low CTC numbers - even in the metastasized situation. To compensate for this dilemma, clinical CTC trials are designed as large multicenter endeavors with decentralized sample collection, processing and storage of products, making data management highly important to enable high-quality translational CTC research., Aim: In the DETECT clinical CTC trials we aimed at developing a custom-made, browser-based virtual database to harmonize and organize both decentralized processing and storage of LB specimens and to enable the collection of clinically meaningful LB sample., Methods: ViBiBa processes data from various sources, harmonizes the data and creates an easily searchable multilayered database., Results: An open-source virtual bio-banking web-application termed ViBiBa was created, which automatically processes data from multiple non-standardized sources. These data are automatically checked and merged into one centralized databank and are providing the opportunity to extract clinically relevant patient cohorts and CTC sample collections., Summary: ViBiBa, which is a highly flexible tool that allows for decentralized sample storage of liquid biopsy specimens, facilitates a solution which promotes collaboration in a user-friendly, federalist and highly structured way. The source code is available under the MIT license from https://vibiba.com or https://github.com/asperciesl/ViBiBa., (Copyright © 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Purpose: To investigate the oncologic and reproductive outcome of a conservative treatment with progestin agents in early-stage grade 1 endometrial cancer (G1EC), grade 2 endometrial cancer (G2EC) or complex atypical hyperplasia (CAH) in young premenopausal women., Methods: Women treated for early-stage endometrial cancer or atypical hyperplasia of the endometrium with a conservative therapy between 2006 and 2018 were enrolled in this retrospective analysis. Progestin agents were orally administered on a daily basis for 3 months for at least one cycle. Endometrial tissue was obtained by hysteroscopy and Dilatation & Curettage (D&C) being performed before and after end of treatment. Therapeutic response was assessed by pathological examination., Results: A total of 14 patients were included. After treatment with progestin agents, 11 of these patients initially showed a complete or partial response. Three patients with early-stage endometrial cancer did not respond. Of the three patients with initially diagnosed atypical hyperplasia, none showed any remaining disease later. Of the eight patients with initially diagnosed endometrial cancer, who had responded to first treatment, three patients were re-diagnosed with endometrial cancer later. One patient with initial endometrial cancer became pregnant but aborted in the 10th week., Conclusion: Due to its good efficacy, progestin agents offer a feasible therapeutic option in the fertility-preserving treatment of early-stage endometrial cancer in young premenopausal women. However, recurrence rate remains high. Therefore, a close follow-up is mandatory, also in responders. Patients should be informed of limitations and risks of conservative treatment. Yet after completion of family planning, hysterectomy should be performed.

Background/aim: Detection of disseminated tumor cells (DTCs) after systemic treatment predicts poor prognosis in breast cancer patients. The aim of our study was to assess the expression of stem-cell marker SOX2 on DTCs and in the primary tumor of patients treated with neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAT)., Materials and Methods: In 170 DTC-positive patients after NAT an additional slide of bone marrow aspirate was stained by double immunofluorescence to detect SOX2-positive DTCs. The SOX2 status of the primary tumor was assessed using the same antibody., Results: The SOX2-status of DTCs was determined in 62 patients and 20 of those (32%) had SOX2 positive DTCs. The SOX2 status of DTCs was not associated with any of the clinicopathological factors. A total of 36% of the patients with a SOX2-negative tumor showed SOX2-positive persistent DTCs., Conclusion: SOX2-positive DTCs can be detected in breast cancer patients after NAT, even in patients with SOX2-negative primary tumors. This suggests that these populations may have evolved independently of each other., (Copyright © 2021 International Institute of Anticancer Research (Dr. George J. Delinasios), All rights reserved.)

Purpose: Postoperative seromas are a problem in the surgical treatment of breast cancer. The aim of the study was to evaluate whether the lysine-urethane-based tissue adhesive TissuGlu ® without drainage is equal/ non-inferior to standard mastecomy with drainage., Methods: The study was designed as a prospective, randomized, multicentre non-inferiority study comparing the use of TissuGlu ® without drainage with standard wound care with a drain insertion in ablative breast procedures. The number of clinical interventions, quality of life and wound complications were followed-up for 90 days in both groups., Results: Although the statistical power was not reached, twice as many clinical interventions were performed in the TissuGlu ® group than in the drainage group, especially aspirations of clinically relevant seromas (p = 0.014). The TissuGlu ® group produced overall less wound fluid, but developed a clinically relevant seroma (100% vs. 63%) which made an intervention necessary. Less hospitalisation time was observed in the TissuGlu ® group, but the complication rate was higher. There was no significant difference in regards to postoperative pain. In summary the non-inferiority of TissuGlu ® compared to standard drainage couldn't be reached., Discussion: The present evaluation shows no advantage of the tissue adhesive TissuGlu ® in terms of seroma formation and frequency of intervention compared to a standard drainage for mastectomies, but the shorter inpatient stay certainly has a positive effect on the quality of life.

Substances with good effectiveness that intervene in specific signalling pathways have been used increasingly in recent years in the treatment of patients with advanced breast cancer, and new therapies and approaches have now been added, which actually relate to quite specific changes, such as the treatment of patients with HR+/HER2 tumours with a PIK3CA mutation. The treatment of patients with a BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutation has also been improved by the introduction of PARP inhibitors. Attempts are now being made increasingly to extend treatment indications based on molecular patterns, to identify other patients who could benefit from a treatment and to integrate the newly established treatment methods in existing therapy sequences. This review articles summarises the latest information in this connection., Competing Interests: Conflict of Interest/Interessenkonflikt A. D. H. received speaker and consultancy honoraria from AstraZeneca, Genomic Health, Roche, Novartis, Celgene, Lilly, MSD, Eisai, Teva, Tesaro, Daiichi Sankyo, Hexal and Pfizer. F. O. received speaker and consultancy honoraria from Amgen, AstraZeneca, Bayer, BMS, Boehringer-Ingelheim, Chugai, Celgene, Cellex, Eisai, Gilead, Hexal, Ipsen, Janssen-Cilag, Merck, MSD, Novartis, Novonordisc, Riemser, Roche, Servier, Shire, Tesaro, Teva. H.-C. K. received honoraria from Carl Zeiss meditec, TEVA, Theraclion, Novartis, Amgen, Astra Zeneca, Pfizer, Janssen-Cilag, GSK, LIV Pharma, Roche and Genomic Health. P. A. F. received honoraria from Novartis, Pfizer, Roche, Amgen, Celgene, Daiichi Sankyo, AstraZeneca, Merck-Sharp & Dohme, Eisai, Puma and Teva. His institution conducts research with funding from Novartis and Biontech. H. T. received honoraria from Novartis, Roche, Celgene, Teva, Pfizer and travel support from Roche, Celgene and Pfizer. J. E. received honoraria from AstraZeneca, Roche, Celgene, Novartis, Lilly, Pfizer, Pierre Fabre, Teva, Daiichi-Sankyo and travel support from Astra, Celgene, Daiichi-Sankyo, Lilly, Novartis, Pfizer, Teva, Pierre Fabre. M. P. L. has participated on advisory boards for AstraZeneca, Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer, Eisai, Genomic Health and Roche and has received honoraria for lectures from MSD, Lilly, Roche, Novartis, Pfizer, Genomic Health, AstraZeneca, medac and Eisai. V. M. received speaker honoraria from Amgen, AstraZeneca, Celgene, Daiichi Sankyo, Eisai, Pfizer, Novartis, Roche, Teva, Janssen-Cilag and consultancy honoraria from Genomic Health, Hexal, Roche, Pierre Fabre, Amgen, Novartis, MSD, Daiichi Sankyo and Eisai, Lilly, Tesaro and Nektar. E. B. received honoraria from Novartis, Hexal and onkowissen.de for consulting, clinical research management or medical education activities. A. S. received honoraria from Roche, Celgene, AstraZeneca, Novartis, Pfizer, Zuckschwerdt Verlag GmbH, Georg Thieme Verlag, Aurikamed GmbH, MCI Deutschland GmbH, bsh medical communications GmbH and promedicis GmbH. W. J. received honoraria and research grants from Novartis, Roche, Pfizer, Lilly, AstraZeneca, Chugai, Sanofi, Daichi, Tesaro. F. S. participated on advisory boards for Novartis, Lilly, Amgen and Roche and received honoraria for lectures from Roche, AstraZeneca, MSD, Novartis and Pfizer. A. W. participated on advisory boards for Novartis, Lilly, Amgen, Pfizer, Roche, Tesaro, Eisai and received honoraria for lectures from Novartis, Pfizer, Aurikamed, Roche, Celgene. D. L. received honoraria from Amgen, AstraZeneca, Celgene, Lilly, Loreal, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer, Tesaro, Teva T. N. F. has participated on advisory boards for Amgen, Daiichi Sankyo, Novartis, Pfizer, and Roche and has received honoraria for lectures from Amgen, Celgene, Daiichi Sankyo, Roche, Novartis and Pfizer. M. T. has participated on advisory boards for AstraZeneca, Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer, Genomic Health and Roche and has received honoraria for lectures from MSD, Lilly, Roche, Novartis, Pfizer, Genomic Health, and AstraZeneca M. W. has participated on advisory boards for AstraZeneca, Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer and Roche. J. H. reports receiving speakers bureau honoraria from Celgene, Novartis, and Roche, and is a consultant/advisory board member for Amgen, Celgene, Novartis and Roche./ A. D. H. hat von AstraZeneca, Genomic Health, Roche, Novartis, Celgene, Lilly, MSD, Eisai, Teva, Tesaro, Daiichi-Sankyo und Hexal und Pfizer Honorare für Referenten- und Beratungstätigkeiten erhalten. F. O. hat von Amgen, AstraZeneca, Bayer, BMS, Boehringer-Ingelheim, Chugai, Celgene, Cellex, Eisai, Gilead, Hexal, Ipsen, Janssen-Cilag, Merck, MSD, Novartis, Novonordisc, Riemser, Roche, Servier, Shire, Tesaro und Teva Honorare für Referenten- und Beratungstätigkeiten erhalten. H.-C. K. hat von Carl Zeiss meditec, Teva, Theraclion, Novartis, Amgen, AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Janssen-Cilag, GSK, LIV Pharma, Roche und Genomic Health Honorare erhalten. P. A. F. hat von Novartis, Pfizer, Roche, Amgen, Celgene, Daiichi-Sankyo, AstraZeneca, Merck-Sharp & Dohme, Eisai, Puma und Teva Honorare erhalten. Seine Institution betreibt Forschung mit finanzieller Unterstützung durch Novartis und Biontech. H. T. hat von Novartis, Roche, Celgene, Teva und Pfizer Honorare und von Roche, Celgene und Pfizer Reisebeihilfen erhalten. J. E. hat von AstraZeneca, Roche, Celgene, Novartis, Lilly, Pfizer, Pierre Fabre, Teva und Daiichi-Sankyo Honorare und von Astra, Celgene, Daiichi-Sankyo, Lilly, Novartis, Pfizer, Teva und Pierre Fabre Reisebeihilfen erhalten. M. P. L. hat für AstraZeneca, Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer, Eisai, Genomic Health und Roche in Beratungsgremien mitgewirkt und von MSD, Lilly, Roche, Novartis, Pfizer, Genomic Health, AstraZeneca, medac und Eisai Vortragshonorare erhalten. V. M. hat von Amgen, AstraZeneca, Celgene, Daiichi-Sankyo, Eisai, Pfizer, Novartis, Roche, Teva und Janssen-Cilag Honorare für Referententätigkeiten und von Genomic Health, Hexal, Roche, Pierre Fabre, Amgen, Novartis, MSD, Daiichi Sankyo und Eisai, Lilly, Tesaro und Nektar Beratungshonorare erhalten. E. B. hat von Novartis, Hexal und onkowissen.de für Beratungstätigkeiten, Leitung klinischer Forschung oder medizinische Schulungsaktivitäten Honorare erhalten. A. S. hat von Roche, Celgene, AstraZeneca, Novartis, Pfizer, Zuckschwerdt Verlag GmbH, Georg Thieme Verlag, Aurikamed GmbH, MCI Deutschland GmbH, bsh medical communications GmbH und promedicis GmbH Honorare erhalten. W. J. hat von Novartis, Roche, Pfizer, Lilly, AstraZeneca, Chugai, Sanofi, Daichi und Tesaro Honorare und Forschungszuschüsse erhalten. F. S. hat für Novartis, Lilly, Amgen und Roche in Beratungsgremien mitgewirkt und von Roche, AstraZeneca, MSD, Novartis und Pfizer Vortragshonorare erhalten. A. W. hat für Novartis, Lilly, Amgen, Pfizer, Roche, Tesaro und Eisai in Beratungsgremien mitgewirkt und von Novartis, Pfizer, Aurikamed, Roche und Celgene Vortragshonorare erhalten. D. L. hat von Amgen, AstraZeneca, Celgene, Lilly, Loreal, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer, Tesaro und Teva Honorare erhalten. T. N. F. hat für Amgen, Daichi Sankyo, Novartis, Pfizer und Roche in Beratungsgremien mitgewirkt und von Amgen, Celgene, Daiichi Sankyo, Roche, Novartis und Pfizer Vortragshonorare erhalten. M. T. hat für AstraZeneca, Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer, Genomic Health und Roche in Beratungsgremien mitgewirkt und von MSD, Lilly, Roche, Novartis, Pfizer, Genomic Health und AstraZeneca Vortragshonorare erhalten. M. W. hat für AstraZeneca, Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer und Roche in Beratungsgremien mitgewirkt. J. H. berichtet, von Celgene, Novartis, und Roche Honorare für Referententätigkeiten erhalten zu haben und ist Berater/Beiratsmitglied von Amgen, Celgene, Novartis und Roche., (The Author(s). This is an open access article published by Thieme under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonDerivative-NonCommercial License, permitting copying and reproduction so long as the original work is given appropriate credit. Contents may not be used for commecial purposes, or adapted, remixed, transformed or built upon. (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).)

Purpose: Endometrioid ovarian carcinoma (ENOC) is generally associated with a more favorable prognosis compared with other ovarian carcinomas. Nonetheless, current patient treatment continues to follow a "one-size-fits-all" approach. Even though tumor staging offers stratification, personalized treatments remain elusive. As ENOC shares many clinical and molecular features with its endometrial counterpart, we sought to investigate The Cancer Genome Atlas-inspired endometrial carcinoma (EC) molecular subtyping in a cohort of ENOC., Experimental Design: IHC and mutation biomarkers were used to segregate 511 ENOC tumors into four EC-inspired molecular subtypes: low-risk POLE mutant (POLEmut), moderate-risk mismatch repair deficient (MMRd), high-risk p53 abnormal (p53abn), and moderate-risk with no specific molecular profile (NSMP). Survival analysis with established clinicopathologic and subtype-specific features was performed., Results: A total of 3.5% of cases were POLEmut, 13.7% MMRd, 9.6% p53abn, and 73.2% NSMP, each showing distinct outcomes ( P < 0.001) and survival similar to observations in EC. Median OS was 18.1 years in NSMP, 12.3 years in MMRd, 4.7 years in p53abn, and not reached for POLEmut cases. Subtypes were independent of stage, grade, and residual disease in multivariate analysis., Conclusions: EC-inspired molecular classification provides independent prognostic information in ENOC. Our findings support investigating molecular subtype-specific management recommendations for patients with ENOC; for example, subtypes may provide guidance when fertility-sparing treatment is desired. Similarities between ENOC and EC suggest that patients with ENOC may benefit from management strategies applied to EC and the opportunity to study those in umbrella trials., (©2020 American Association for Cancer Research.)

Purpose: High throughput panel sequencing to tailor therapy in precision oncology promises to improve outcome in patients with metastatic breast cancer. However, data that clearly show any benefit from such an approach is still pending., Materials and Methods: We performed a retrospective analysis of advanced breast cancer patients that underwent panel sequencing for suggestion of target related drugs. We aimed to (i) determine the frequency of actionable mutations per patient and to (ii) assess the clinical impact of results on treatment options., Results: A total of 52 patients underwent panel sequencing of archived tumor tissue. Every sample showed at least one affected gene, accounting for actionable mutations in 45 of 52 patients (87%). New treatment options that would not have been used as indicated by standard predictive markers (such as hormonal receptor status or HER2-status) were found in 22 of 52 patients (42%). We detected therapeutic relevant pathogenic germline variants in 9,6% (5/52) of the patients., Conclusions: Using a high throughput-panel sequencing approach to identify actionable mutations in patients with metastatic breast cancer, we identified potential target-related treatment options in a large proportion of our patients, some of which would not have been considered without this data. Prospective clinical trials with compounds targeting the identified actionable mutations are needed to determine which treatments can indeed improve survival or quality of life by limiting exposure to ineffective drugs in advanced breast cancer., Competing Interests: CONFLICTS OF INTEREST MK and MS are employees of Praxis fuer Humangenetik. FB is an employee of CeGaT GmbH. Praxis fuer Humangenetik and CeGaT GmbH offer clinical tumor diagnostics. ADH received honoraria and travel expenses from AstraZeneca, Eisai, GenomicHealth, Lilly, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer, Roche, Tesaro, Teva, Amgen and Hexal. FAT received honoraria and travel expenses from AstraZeneka, Tesaro, Roche, Novartis and Hexal. All other authors declare no conflicts of interests.

Breast cancers (BC) can mutate, allowing metastatic tumors (MT) to sometimes differ to primary tumors (PT) in gene expression. Despite contemporary metastatic breast cancer (MBC) therapy, subtype conversion seems prognostically disadvantageous. We strived to determine the influence of mRNA-assessed intrinsic subtype stability comparing PT and MT biopsies and circulating tumor cell (CTC)-based liquid biopsies on progression free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS). Additional analyzed prognostic factors were PT subtype, MT subtype and hormone receptor loss. Kaplan-Meier curves and the log rank tests were used to compare PFSs and OSs. The proportions of luminal B and triple negative subtype MTs were increased compared to those observed in PTs. Fifteen patients were found to have tumors that underwent intrinsic subtype conversion and their OS was significantly decreased ( p = 0.038). No such difference was observed when it comes to PFS. The majority of these tumors switched to a more aggressive intrinsic subtype. No significant differences in PFSs or OSs were observed between subtype converters with triple negative PTs compared to those with luminal subtype PTs. The same is true of subtype stable patients. Total CTC, iCTC and aCTC counts decreased with therapy, but there were no significant differences between subtype converters and subtype stable patients. Our data confirm a poorer overall survival of the intrinsic subtype converters and emphasize the importance of acquiring biopsies and re-biopsies of all available metastatic lesions alongside with CTC-based liquid biopsies for earlier recognition of patients with poorer prognosis and in need of altered individualized therapy regimens.

Circulating tumor cell (CTC) detection is a prognostic factor in the metastatic breast cancer (MBC) setting. Discrepancies in primary (PT) and metastatic tumor (MT) genetic profiles are also of prognostic importance. Our study aimed to compare the CTC statuses and prognoses between those with subtype stable MBCs and MBCs with specific biomarker conversions. The study enrolled 261 MBC patients, treated at the National Center for Tumor Diseases, Heidelberg, Germany in a five-year period. All underwent PT and MT biopsies and subsequent CTC enumeration before the initiation of systemic therapy. ER and HER2 statuses of the PTs and MTs were determined and progression free survivals (PFSs) and overall survivals (OSs) were recorded. We compared CTC statuses, CTC counts, PFSs and OSs between subgroups of patients with different receptor change patterns. Patients who had tumors that converted to triple negative MTs had the shortest median OSs, while HER2 expression was not associated with a shorter median OS. No significant differences in PFSs and OSs have been demonstrated by Kaplan-Meier curve comparisons in any of the subgroup analyses. CTC counts were similar in all subgroups. CTCs were comparably less frequently detected in patients with a stable HER2 expression. Similar proportions of CTC positives were observed in all other subtype change pattern subgroups, barring the aforementioned HER2 stable subgroup. The detection of CTCs was of no appreciable prognostic value in different receptor change pattern subgroups in our cohort.

Purpose: Data on the optimal treatment strategy for patients undergoing neoadjuvant therapy (NAT) who initially presented with metastatic nodes and convert to node-negative disease (cN+ → ycN0) are limited. Since NAT leads to axillary downstaging in 20-60% of patients, the question arises whether these patients might be offered less-invasive procedures than axillary dissection, such as sentinel node biopsy or targeted removal of lymph nodes marked before therapy., Methods: We performed a systematic review of clinical studies on the use of axillary ultrasound for prediction of response to NAT and ultrasound-guided marking of metastatic nodes for targeted axillary dissection., Results: The sensitivity of ultrasound for prediction of residual node metastasis was higher than that of clinical examination and MRI/PET in most studies; specificity ranged in large trials from 37 to 92%. The diagnostic performance of ultrasound after NAT seems to be associated with tumor subtype: the positive predictive value was highest in luminal, the negative in triple-negative tumors. Several trials evaluated the usefulness of ultrasound for targeted axillary dissection. Before NAT, nodes were most commonly marked using ultrasound-guided clip placement, followed by ultrasound-guided placement of a radioactive seed. After chemotherapy, the clip was detected on ultrasound in 72-83% of patients; a comparison of sonographic visibility of different clips is lacking. Detection rate after radioactive seed placement was ca. 97%., Conclusion: In conclusion, ultrasound improves prediction of axillary response to treatment in comparison to physical examination and serves as a reliable guiding tool for marking of target lymph nodes before the start of treatment. High quality and standardization of the examination is crucial for selection of patients for less-invasive surgery.

Hematogenous dissemination of single tumor cells from the primary tumor is a common phenomenon in most solid malignancies. In breast cancer, presence of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) in the peripheral blood and disseminated tumor cells (DTCs) in bone marrow predicts poor clinical outcome, both in early and metastatic setting. Beyond that, persistence of CTCs/DTCs is associated with shorter relapse-free interval as well. Numerous studies have shown that these cells differ from tumor cells in the primary tumor with regard to hormone and HER2 receptor status and it has been hypothesized that some of them might be in fact cancer stem cells. Recently, the first positive study on CTC-based therapy interventions has been presented at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium 2018, demonstrating that detection of CTCs may guide treatment decisions in metastatic HR-positive HER2-negative disease. In this review, we present the current state of evidence of tumor cell dissemination and discuss the implications for future trials., Competing Interests: Conflict of Interest AH received an institutional research grant from GenomicHealth and honoraria from Roche, Novartis, Pfizer, Lilly and Amgen. MBP received lecture honoraria and served in advisory role for Roche, Novartis, Pfizer and Lilly.

Background: Inherited pathogenic variants in BRCA1 and BRCA2 are the most common causes of hereditary breast and ovarian cancer (HBOC). The risk of developing breast cancer by age 80 in women carrying a BRCA1 pathogenic variant is 72%. The lifetime risk varies between families and even within affected individuals of the same family. The cause of this variability is largely unknown, but it is hypothesized that additional genetic factors contribute to differences in age at onset (AAO). Here we investigated whether truncating and rare missense variants in genes of different DNA-repair pathways contribute to this phenomenon., Methods: We used extreme phenotype sampling to recruit 133 BRCA1-positive patients with either early breast cancer onset, below 35 (early AAO cohort) or cancer-free by age 60 (controls). Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) was used to screen for variants in 311 genes involved in different DNA-repair pathways., Results: Patients with an early AAO (73 women) had developed breast cancer at a median age of 27 years (interquartile range (IQR); 25.00-27.00 years). A total of 3703 variants were detected in all patients and 43 of those (1.2%) were truncating variants. The truncating variants were found in 26 women of the early AAO group (35.6%; 95%-CI 24.7 - 47.7%) compared to 16 women of controls (26.7%; 95%-CI 16.1 to 39.7%). When adjusted for environmental factors and family history, the odds ratio indicated an increased breast cancer risk for those carrying an additional truncating DNA-repair variant to BRCA1 mutation (OR: 3.1; 95%-CI 0.92 to 11.5; p-value = 0.07), although it did not reach the conventionally acceptable significance level of 0.05., Conclusions: To our knowledge this is the first time that the combined effect of truncating variants in DNA-repair genes on AAO in patients with hereditary breast cancer is investigated. Our results indicate that co-occurring truncating variants might be associated with an earlier onset of breast cancer in BRCA1-positive patients. Larger cohorts are needed to confirm these results.

Background: Treatment of postmenopausal, hormone receptor-positive metastatic breast cancer (MBC) patients varies despite clear therapy guidelines, favoring endocrine treatment (ET). Aim of this study was to analyze persistence of palliative aromatase inhibitor (AI) monotherapy in MBC patients., Methods: EvAluate-TM is a prospective, multicenter, noninterventional study to evaluate treatment with letrozole in postmenopausal women with hormone receptor-positive breast cancer. To assess therapy persistence, defined as the time from therapy start to the end of the therapy (TTEOT), two pre-specified study visits took place after 6 and 12 months. Competing risk survival analyses were performed to identify patient and tumor characteristics that predict TTEOT., Results: Out of 200 patients, 66 patients terminated treatment prematurely, 26 (13%) of them due to causes other than disease progression. Persistence rate for reasons other than progression at 12 months was 77.7%. Persistence was lower in patients who reported any adverse event (AE) in the first 30 days of ET (89.5% with no AE and 56% with AE). Furthermore, patients had a lower persistence if they reported compliance problems in the past before letrozole treatment., Conclusions: Despite suffering from a life-threatening disease, AEs of an AI will result in a relevant number of treatment terminations that are not related to progression. Some subgroups of patients have very low persistence rates. Especially with regard to novel endocrine combination therapies, these data imply that some groups of patients will need special attention to guide them through the therapy process., Trial Registration: Clinical Trials Number: CFEM345DDE19.

The presence of circulating tumor cells (CTCs), detected as a form of liquid biopsy is associated with poor survival in both early and metastatic breast cancer. Monitoring tumor biology based on intrinsic subtypes delivers treatment-relevant information on the heterogeneity or biomarker conversion between primary and metastatic tumors. This study aimed to correlate the change of the apoptotic and intact CTC counts with mRNA-assessed intrinsic subtype change. Thirty-four breast cancer patients with available triplets of primary tumors, distant metastasis biopsies and data on intact and apoptotic CTC dynamics were included in the analysis. The intrinsic subtype was determined per RT-qPCR quantification of the gene expression ESR1, PGR, ERBB2 and MKI67. Both luminal ( p = 0.038) and triple negative ( p = 0.035) patients showed a significant downregulation of apoptotic CTCs. Repeated biopsies of distant metastatic sites, as well as determining a potential shift of the intrinsic subtype, combined with data on intact and apoptotic CTC dynamics from liquid biopsies might help personalize systemic therapy and generate additional surrogate markers for successful systemic therapy.

In breast cancer (BC), elevated levels of urokinase-type plasminogen activator (uPA) in tumor tissue have been confirmed as a strong prognostic factor in level-of-evidence-1 studies. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the clinical relevance of uPA levels in serum of metastatic BC patients and to compare uPA with other blood-based biomarkers. 252 patients were enrolled in this prospective, multicentre study. Blood samples were collected before begin of first-line or later-line systemic treatment. Serum uPA was quantified by a commercially available ELISA. Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) were detected using CellSearch; other biomarkers (EGFR, VEGF, HER2, RAS p21, TIMP1, CAIX) by ELISA. Using the ROC analysis, the optimal cut-off value (determined by the Youden index) of serum uPA was 2.52 ng/ml. Using this value, 26% of patients had elevated uPA levels. Patients with visceral metastasis and more than one metastatic site were significantly more likely to present with elevated uPA levels. CTC status, serum HER2, RAS p21, CAIX, TIMP1 and VEGF correlated significantly with uPA levels. Elevated uPA levels predicted shorter overall and progression-free survival in univariate analysis (median OS: 7.5 months [95%-CI 4.5-10.5 months] vs. not reached, p < 0.001; PFS: 4.8 [95%-CI: 3.1-6.5] vs. 9.1 [7.4-10.8] months, p < 0.001). In multivariate analysis, elevated uPA, presence of ≥5 CTCs, elevated RAS p21, higher grading and higher line of therapy were independent predictors of shorter OS, while elevated CTC counts, higher line of therapy and negative estrogen receptor status were independent predictors of shorter PFS. In conclusion, elevated uPA levels independently predict reduced overall survival and improved prognostication in patients with known CTC status. Whether high serum uPA might identify patients most likely to benefit from therapies targeting uPA, remains to be evaluated in future trials.

Haematogenic dissemination of tumour cells in breast carcinoma is among the most intensively researched areas in translational oncology. Large meta-analyses have shown the prognostic relevance of the disseminated tumour cells in the bone marrow and circulating tumour cells in the peripheral blood in the adjuvant as well as metastatic setting. The current status of the research was discussed in detail during the annual meeting of the German Society of Senology in Berlin. The following conference report gives an overview of the clinical study landscape and the new methodological developments for improving the detection and phenotyping of the circulating and disseminated tumour cells.

Purpose: VEGF is one of the most important angiogenesis-stimulating cytokines and has been previously shown to be overexpressed in several solid cancers. The aim of the present study was to assess the clinical relevance of serum VEGF (sVEGF) in a large cohort of metastatic breast cancer patients and to explore the relationship between sVEGF and other blood-based biomarkers., Methods: Two hundred fifty-three patients with metastatic breast cancer were enrolled in this prospective, multicentre study. Blood samples were collected before start of first-line or later-line treatment. sVEGF was quantified by a commercially available ELISA. Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) were detected using CellSearch and other biomarkers (EGFR, HER2, RAS p21, TIMP1, CAIX) by ELISA., Results: Levels of sVEGF were determined in all patients, with a median concentration of 231 pg/ml. After a median follow-up of 19 months, median overall survival (OS) was 10.2 months in patients with sVEGF levels above the upper quartile (i.e. 367 pg/ml), while median OS has not been reached in patients with sVEGF < 367 pg/ml (p < 0.001). Median progression-free survival (PFS) was 4.8 months for patients with sVEGF ≥ 367 pg/ml versus 9.1 months with sVEGF levels < 367 pg/ml (p < 0.001). Patients with sVEGF levels ≥ 367 pg/ml and ≥ 5 CTCs had the shortest OS, while those with sVEGF < 367 pg/ml and non-elevated CTCs had the longest OS. CTCs, grading, line of therapy and RAS p21 were independent predictors of OS. sVEGF, line of therapy and CTCs were independent predictors of PFS in the multivariate analysis., Conclusions: Metastatic breast cancer patients with elevated levels of sVEGF have significantly worse clinical outcome. This finding supports the biological role of VEGF in breast cancer., Trial Registration: Current Controlled Trials ISRCTN59722891 (DETECT).

Background/aim: Only 30-50% of patients with sentinel lymph node (SLN) metastases present with further axillary lymph node metastases. Therefore, up to 70% of patients with positive SLN are overtreated by axillary dissection (AD) and may suffer from complications such as sensory disturbances or lymphedema. According to the current S3 guidelines, AD can be avoided in patients with a T1/T2 tumor if breast-conserving surgery with subsequent tangential irradiation is performed and no more than two SLNs are affected. Additionally, use of nomograms, that predict the probability of non-sentinel lymph node (NSLN) metastases, is recommended. Therefore, models for the prediction of NSLN metastases in our defined population were constructed and compared with the published nomograms., Patients and Methods: In a retrospective study, 2,146 primary breast cancer patients, who underwent SLN biopsy at the University Women's Hospital in Tuebingen, were evaluated by dividing the patient group in a training and validation collective (TC or VC). Using the SLN-positive TC patients, three models for the prediction of the likelihood of NSLN metastases were adapted and were then validated using the SLN-positive VC patients. In addition, the predictive power of nomograms from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC), Stanford, and the Cambridge model were compared with regard to our patient collective., Results: A total of 2,146 patients were included in the study. Of these, 470 patients had positive SLN, 295 consisted the training collective and 175 consisted the validation collective. In a regression model, three variants - with 11, 6 and 2 variables - were developed for the prediction of NSLN metastases in our defined population and compared to the most frequently used nomograms. Our variants with 11 and with 6 variables were proven to be a particularly suitable model and showed similarly good results as the published MSKCC nomogram., Conclusion: Our developed nomograms may be used as a prediction tool for NSLN metastases after positive SLN., (Copyright© 2018, International Institute of Anticancer Research (Dr. George J. Delinasios), All rights reserved.)

Background: We conducted a meta-analysis in nonmetastatic breast cancer patients treated by neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NCT) to assess the clinical validity of circulating tumor cell (CTC) detection as a prognostic marker., Methods: We collected individual patient data from 21 studies in which CTC detection by CellSearch was performed in early breast cancer patients treated with NCT. The primary end point was overall survival, analyzed according to CTC detection, using Cox regression models stratified by study. Secondary end points included distant disease-free survival, locoregional relapse-free interval, and pathological complete response. All statistical tests were two-sided., Results: Data from patients were collected before NCT (n = 1574) and before surgery (n = 1200). CTC detection revealed one or more CTCs in 25.2% of patients before NCT; this was associated with tumor size (P < .001). The number of CTCs detected had a detrimental and decremental impact on overall survival (P < .001), distant disease-free survival (P < .001), and locoregional relapse-free interval (P < .001), but not on pathological complete response. Patients with one, two, three to four, and five or more CTCs before NCT displayed hazard ratios of death of 1.09 (95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.65 to 1.69), 2.63 (95% CI = 1.42 to 4.54), 3.83 (95% CI = 2.08 to 6.66), and 6.25 (95% CI = 4.34 to 9.09), respectively. In 861 patients with full data available, adding CTC detection before NCT increased the prognostic ability of multivariable prognostic models for overall survival (P < .001), distant disease-free survival (P < .001), and locoregional relapse-free interval (P = .008)., Conclusions: CTC count is an independent and quantitative prognostic factor in early breast cancer patients treated by NCT. It complements current prognostic models based on tumor characteristics and response to therapy.

Background: The assessment of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) has been shown to enable monitoring of treatment response and early detection of metastatic breast cancer (MBC) recurrence. The aim of this study was to compare a well-established CTC detection method based on immunomagnetic isolation with a new, filtration-based platform., Methods: In this prospective study, two 7.5 ml blood draws were obtained from 60 MBC patients and CTC enumeration was assessed using both the CellSearch® and the newly developed filtration-based platform. We analyzed the correlation of CTC-positivity between both methods and their ability to predict prognosis. Overall survival (OS) was calculated and Kaplan-Meier curves were estimated with thresholds of ≥1 and ≥5 detected CTCs., Results: The CTC positivity rate of the CellSearch® system was 56.7% and of the filtration-based platform 66.7%. There was a high correlation of CTC enumeration obtained with both methods. The OS for patients without detected CTCs, regardless of the method used, was significantly higher compared to patients with one or more CTCs (p < 0.001). The median OS of patients with no CTCs vs. ≥ 1 CTC assessed by CellSearch® was 1.83 years (95% CI: 1.63-2.02) vs. 0.74 years (95% CI: 0.51-1.52). If CTCs were detected by the filtration-based method the median OS times were 1.88 years (95% CI: 1.74-2.03) vs. 0.59 years (95% CI: 0.38-0.80)., Conclusions: The newly established EpCAM independently filtration-based system is a suitable method to determine CTC counts for MBC patients. Our study confirms CTCs as being strong predictors of prognosis in our population of MBC patients.

Purpose: Our aim was to implement a structured literature search using PICO (patient/intervention/comparison/outcome) questions and a standardized consensus method for the German Guideline 'Detection, diagnostics, therapy and follow-up of Breast Cancer' using, as an example, the significance of systemic therapy in lymph node recurrent disease (LNRD)., Methods: We defined specified PICO questions according to the clinical significance of a recommendation for systemic therapies in locoregional LNRD. A methodologist performed a systematic literature search including randomized controlled trials, systematic reviews and observational studies (2007-2016). In a consensus conference, the level of evidence and consensus was determined and the clinical recommendation was adopted., Results: In total 143 publications were identified according to the search strategy including 14 duplicates, which were excluded. 4 publications were included based on experts' choice. The team excluded 119 publications, leaving 14 that were then screened by a full text search. Finally, 1 publication was found to be of methodologically and clinically reliable content. The conclusion of this publication in favor of systemic therapy for LNRD received strong consent from the consensus conference., Conclusions: The literature search strategy using PICO questions helped to achieve a fast and standardized selection of publications. The recommendation concerning systemic treatment of LNRD was first implemented in the update of the German Breast Cancer guideline., (© 2018 S. Karger GmbH, Freiburg.)