THE CLINICAL RELEVANCE OF STATIC DISEASE (NO CHANGE) CATEGORY FOR 6 MONTHS ON ENDOCRINE THERAPY IN PATIENTS WITH BREAST-CANCER

This study reports on the clinical relevance of the static disease (SD ) category in 255 breast cancer patients on endocrine therapy. All pat ients had received first-and second-line endocrine therapy and were as sessed for response by the International Union Against Cancer (UICC) c riteria. We did not include patients who received first-line endocrine therapy but did not or have not yet proceeded to second-line hormone therapy, e.g. died from rapidly progressive disease, started chemother apy for rapidly progressive disease, remained in long-term remission o n first-line endocrine therapy. We analysed survival from initiation o f first-line endocrine therapy by the remission criteria, i.e. complet e response (CR), partial response (PR), static disease (SD) or progres sive disease (PD), achieved on that therapy. Patients were divided int o those with metastatic breast cancer (MBC) and non-metastatic disease . There was no significant difference in survival from starting first- line endocrine therapy between patients who obtained CR, PR or SD: all three groups of patients survived significantly longer than patients who showed PD within 6 months (all P < 0.0001 except CR versus PD [MBC ] which was P < 0.002). Equally, for second-line endocrine therapy the re was no difference in survival between patients who obtained CR, PR or SD: all three groups (CR, PR and SD) survived significantly longer than PD (all P < 0.0003 except for CR versus PD which was P < 0.003 fo r non-metastatic and P < 0.059 for MBC). Durable SD appears to be a cl inically useful criteria of therapeutic remission. (C) 1997 Elsevier S cience Ltd.