P. Ballerini et al., URINARY TESTOSTERONE AS A MARKER OF RISK OF RECURRENCE IN OPERABLE BREAST-CANCER, Breast cancer research and treatment, 26(1), 1993, pp. 1-6
We investigated the role of urinary testosterone levels as a marker of
risk of recurrent disease in 113 operable breast cancer patients (70
premenopausal, 43 postmenopausal). Twenty-four-hour urine collections
for testosterone measurement were obtained before surgical treatment,
between 20-40 days thereafter, and then every 6 months for 5 years. Th
e cutoff values to separate 'high testosterone (A+)' from 'normal test
osterone (A-)' were 8.0 mug/24 h in premenopause and 4.9 mug/24 h in p
ostmenopause. Urinary testosterone levels were considered high when th
ey exceeded the cutoff value in at least 2 of the first 3 measurements
(pretreatment, post-treatment, 6 months) of each patient. According t
o the aforementioned criterion, 33 patients (29.2%) had high testoster
one levels, which were associated to axillary node involvement in 16 p
atients. Thirteen of the latter relapsed during the 5-year follow-up p
eriod (5/7 in premenopause, 8/9 in postmenopause). Relapse-free surviv
al (RFS) curves were drawn only for node-positive patients owning to t
he small number of recurrences observed in the node-negative group. In
premenopausal node-positive patients, RFS was significantly different
for patients presenting high and normal urinary testosterone levels (
77% vs 28%, respectively; logrank test, p < 0.006). In postmenopausal
node-positive patients, RFS was also different between the two groups
(54% vs 11% in 'high' and 'normal' excretors, respectively) but the di
fference was not statistically significant. The present findings sugge
st that urinary testosterone is a prognostic indicator of early breast
cancer recurrence in node-positive patients.