Dr. Spring on the Association Between pCR and Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy

Laura Spring, MD, medical oncologist at Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center and instructor in medicine at Harvard Medical School, discusses the association between pathologic complete response (pCR) and neoadjuvant chemotherapy in patients with breast cancer at the 2018 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium.

Spring and her colleagues performed the largest meta-analysis to date looking at the prognostic significance of achievement of pCR following neoadjuvant chemotherapy in all breast cancer subtypes. Investigators focused on studies that reported pCR rates as well as long-term outcomes based on pCR or residual disease.

Any study that used neoadjuvant chemotherapy and reported both pCR rates and long-term outcomes were included; however, these studies had to have enrolled at least 25 patients or more, and the stricter definition of pCR endorsed by the FDA was used. Studies were excluded from the analysis if participants received prior radiation or endocrine therapy, while others were included irrespective of whether patients had received anti-HER2 therapy or not. Investigators found that achieving a pCR following neoadjuvant chemotherapy had a significant association with decreased recurrence and improved overall survival, says Spring.