To The Editor
I want to congratulate Dr. Tan and colleagues for their article entitled “Weekly taxane-anthracycline combination regimen versus tri-weekly anthracycline-based regimen for the treatment of locally advanced breast cancer: a randomized controlled trial” [1]. The pathologic complete response (pCR) rate was similar in the two arms (10.61% vs. 12.31%, P = 0.665). However, the authors did not stratify patients according to molecular subtypes such as luminal A and B, human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)-positive and triple-negative breast cancers (TNBC). Rouzier et al. [2] reported that the patients in TNBC and HER2-positive subgroups had the highest rates of pCR (45% and 45%), whereas the patients with luminal tumors had a pCR rate of 6% after neoadjuvant chemotherapy. Since HER2-positive and TNBC subgroups of tumors are more sensitive to chemotherapy, pCR rates in these tumors are expected to be more than 20%–25%. Taken all together, the evaluation of pCR rates after chemotherapy in locally advanced breast cancer patients would be better evaluated according to molecular subtypes.
I confirm that I have read BioMed Central’s guidance on competing interests. I have no competing interests in the manuscript.
References
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1.
Tan QW, Luo T, Zheng H, Tian TL, He P, Chen J, et al. Weekly taxane-anthracycline combination regimen versus tri-weekly anthracycline-based regimen for the treatment of locally advanced breast cancer: a randomized controlled trial. Chin J Cancer. 2017; 36(1):27.
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2.
Rouzier R, Perou CM, Symmans WF, Ibrahim N, Cristofanilli M, Anderson K, et al. Breast cancer molecular subtypes respond differently to preoperative chemotherapy. Clin Cancer Res. 2005;11(16):5678–85.