title: [Management of inflammatory breast cancer after neo-adjuvant chemotherapy].
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To assess the benefit of breast surgery for inflammatory breast cancer.
  
  
  METHODS
  This retrospective series was based on 232 patients treated for inflammatory breast cancer. All patients received primary chemotherapy followed by either exclusive radiotherapy (118 patients, 51%) or surgery with or without radiotherapy (114 patients, 49%). The median follow-up was 11 years.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The two groups were comparable apart from fewer tumors smaller than 70 mm (43% vs 33%, P=0.003), a higher rate of clinical stage N2 (15% vs 5%, P=0.04) and fewer histopathological grade 3 tumors (46% vs 61%, P<0.05) in the no-surgery group. The addition of surgery was associated with a significant improvement in locoregional disease control (P=0.04) but with no significant difference in overall survival rates or disease-free intervals. Late toxicities were not significantly different between the two treatment groups except for a higher rate of fibrosis in the no-surgery group (P<0.0001), and more lymphedema in the surgery group (P=0.002).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our data suggest an improvement in locoregional control in patients treated by surgery, in conjunction with chemotherapy and radiotherapy, for inflammatory breast cancer.
authors.affiliation: Service d'Onco-Radiothérapie, Institut Curie, 26, rue d'Ulm, 75005 Paris cedex 05, France.
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Abrous-Anane
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Savignoni
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Daveau
authors.forename: J-Y
authors.initials: JY
authors.lastname: Pierga
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Gautier
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Reyal
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Dendale
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Campana
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Kirova
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Fourquet
authors.forename: M-A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Bollet
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D017024:Chemotherapy, Adjuvant; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D058922:Inflammatory Breast Neoplasms / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000532:radiotherapy / Q000601:surgery*; D008875:Middle Aged; D012189:Retrospective Studies