Dr. Abdou on Race and Clinical Outcomes in Breast Cancer

Yara Abdou, MD, assistant professor, UNC School of Medicine, discusses racial disparities in breast cancer outcomes in patients enrolled to the phase 3 RxPONDER trial (NCT01272037).

In total, 4,048 patients were included in an analysis of clinicopathologic characteristics, survival outcomes, and race in the RxPONDER trial, Abdou says. Although this analysis found no significant differences in the number of positive lymph nodes or recurrence score distribution across all cohorts, tumor grade was found to be significantly different among the cohorts, Abdou notes.

Specifically, non-Hispanic Black patients had fewer low-grade tumors and more high-grade tumors vs non-Hispanic White patients, Abdou explains. Additionally, non-Hispanic Black patients had worse invasive disease-free survival and distant relapse-free survival rates vs non-Hispanic White patients, even when the data were adjusted for recurrence score, treatment arm, menopausal status, age, and grade, Abdou concludes.