title: Effects of two chemotherapy regimens, anthracycline-based and CMF, on breast cancer disease free survival in the Eastern Mediterranean Region and Asia: a meta-analysis approach for survival curves.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  To compare the effects of two adjuvant chemotherapy regimens, anthracycline-based and cyclophosphamide, methotrexate, fluorourical (CMF) on disease free survival for breast cancer patients in the Eastern Mediterranean region and Asia.
  
  
  METHODS
  In a systematic review with a multivariate mixed model meta-analysis, the reported survival proportion at multiple time points in different studies were combined. Our data sources were studies linking the two chemotherapy regimens on an adjuvant basis with disease free survival published in English and Persian in the Eastern Mediterranean region and Asia. All survival curves were generated with Graphdigitizer software.
  
  
  RESULTS
  14 retrospective cohort studies were located from electronic databases. We analyzed data for 1,086 patients who received anthracycline-based treatment and 1,109 given CMF treatment. For determination of survival proportions and time we usesb the transformation Ln (-Ln(S)) and Ln (time) to make precise estimations and then fit the model. All analyses were carried out with STATA software.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our findings showed a significant efficacy of anthracycline-based adjuvant therapy regarding disease free survival of breast cancer. As a limitation in this meta-analysis we used studies with different types of anthracycline-based regimens.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biostatistics, Research Center of Infertility, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran. najafzare@sums.ac.ir
authors.forename: Najaf
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Zare
authors.forename: Saeed
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Ghanbari
authors.forename: Alireza
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Salehi
mesh_terms: D018943:Anthracyclines / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D000971:Antineoplastic Combined Chemotherapy Protocols / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D001208:Asia; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000401:mortality*; D003520:Cyclophosphamide / Q000627:therapeutic use; D005260:Female; D005472:Fluorouracil / Q000627:therapeutic use; D006801:Humans; D019083:Mediterranean Region; D008727:Methotrexate / Q000627:therapeutic use; D011379:Prognosis; D015996:Survival Rate
chemical_list: D018943:Anthracyclines; D003520:Cyclophosphamide; D005472:Fluorouracil; D008727:Methotrexate