J Breast Cancer.  2017 Dec;20(4):378-385. 10.4048/jbc.2017.20.4.378.

Improved Model for Predicting Axillary Response to Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy in Patients with Clinically Node-Positive Breast Cancer

• Kim HS
• Shin MS
• Kim CJ
• Yoo SH
• Yoo TK
• Eom YH
• Chae BJ
• Song BJ

• KMID: 2398208
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.4048/jbc.2017.20.4.378

Abstract

PURPOSE
Pathological complete response (pCR) of axillary lymph node (LN) is frequently achieved in patients with clinically node-positive breast cancer after neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC). Treatment of the axilla after NAC is not well established and the value of sentinel LN biopsy following NAC remains unclear. This study investigated the predictive value of axillary response following NAC and evaluated the predictive value of a model based on axillary response.
METHODS
Data prospectively collected on 201 patients with clinically node-positive breast cancer who were treated with NAC and underwent axillary LN dissection (ALND) were retrieved. A model predictive of axillary pCR was developed based on clinicopathologic variables. The overall predictive ability between models was compared by receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis.
RESULTS
Of 201 patients who underwent ALND after NAC, 68 (33.8%) achieved axillary pCR. Multivariate analysis using axillary LN pCR after NAC as the dependent variable showed that higher histologic grade (p=0.031; odds ratio [OR], 2.537; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.087-5.925) and tumor response rate ≥47.1% (p=0.001; OR, 3.212; 95% CI, 1.584-6.515) were significantly associated with an increased probability of achieving axillary pCR. The area under the ROC curve for estimating axillary pCR was significantly higher in the model that included tumor response rate than in the model that excluded this rate (0.732 vs. 0.649, p=0.022).
CONCLUSION
Tumor response rate was the most significant independent predictor of axillary pCR in response to NAC. The model that included tumor response rate was a significantly better predictor of axillary pCR than the model that excluded tumor response rate.

Keyword

Axilla; Breast neoplasms; Lymph nodes; Neoadjuvant therapy

MeSH Terms

Axilla
Biopsy
Breast Neoplasms*
Breast*
Drug Therapy*
Humans
Lymph Nodes
Multivariate Analysis
Neoadjuvant Therapy
Odds Ratio
Polymerase Chain Reaction
Prospective Studies
ROC Curve

Figure

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  Figure 1 Study profile. Two hundred one patients with cytologically positive axillary lymph node (LN) metastasis confirmed by core needle biopsy who received neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC) were enrolled in this study.

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  Figure 2 Receiver operating characteristics curve (ROC) of the each models to predict axillary pathologic complete response. The area under the ROC curve is 0.732, 95% confidence interval (0.661–0.804) in model 4.

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