The lack of increases in circulating endothelial progenitor cell as a negative predictor for pathological response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy in breast cancer patients

Abstract

Breast cancer: Circulating cell counts predict chemo response Breast cancer patients do better after preoperative chemotherapy if their numbers of circulating endothelial progenitor cells (CEPs) go up. A team from Japan led by Takayuki Ueno from the Kyorin University School of Medicine in Tokyo studied 57 women who underwent neoadjuvant chemotherapy to shrink the size of their tumors before surgery. The researchers measured the number of CEPs—cells that derive from the bone marrow and can help build new blood vessels around tumors—both before and during chemotherapy. They found no link between overall CEP counts and treatment response. However, patients whose CEP numbers went up between cycles of chemotherapy had better outcomes. The authors suggest that CEP counts could be used as a diagnostic tool for predicting responses to neoadjuvant chemotherapy, although larger studies are needed to confirm their initial findings