Addition of Adjuvant Tamoxifen to Cyclophosphamide, Methotrexate and 5-Fluorouracil for Premenopausal Women with Oestrogen Receptor-Positive Breast Cancer

Abstract

To study the value of adjuvant tamoxifen (TAM) in premenopausal women with oestrogen receptor (ER)-positive breast cancer who received adjuvant cyclophosphamide, methotrexate and 5-fluorouracil (CMF) polychemotherapy. Methods: Four hundred and two premenopausal ER-positive breast cancer patients who received CMF chemotherapy between January 1990 and December 1999 were retrospectively studied. Disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) were used to evaluate the clinical value of TAM therapy. The relationships between nodal status and TAM were also analysed. Results: After a mean of 41 months of follow-up, 43 (13.7%) patients died of breast cancer and 68 (19.9%) patients suffered recurrence. There was a significant difference between TAM and non-TAM treatment groups for DFS (p = 0.0058), but no significant difference for OS. For node-negative patients, there was no significant difference between the TAM and non-TAM treatment groups for either DFS or OS. For node-positive patients, the difference between TAM and non-TAM treatment groups was significant for both DFS and OS (p = 0.0497 and p = 0.0285, respectively). Conclusion: TAM resulted in additional benefit to premenopausal patients with node-positive ER-positive breast cancer who received the CMF polychemotherapy regimen.