title: Use of Palliative Endocrine Therapy in Patients with Hormone Receptor-Positive Distant Metastatic Breast Cancer: How Often, How Effective, How Long?
abstract: BACKGROUND
  This study provides real-world clinical evidence regarding palliative endocrine therapy (ET) in breast cancer (BC). The main questions to be answered were: how often and how long did patients receive ET? A particular aspect was the analysis of compliance and persistence with ET.
  
  
  METHODS
  An analysis of a nonselected/consecutive cohort of women with distant metastatic hormone receptor-positive BC (n = 205) was conducted.
  
  
  RESULTS
  In all, 165 patients (80.5%) received ET during the palliative disease course. The noncompliance rate was 1.5%. Sixty-seven patients (40.6%) had ET as the only antineoplastic therapy. The median number of therapy lines was 2, and the median duration was 18 months. The median metastatic disease survival (MDS) was 34 months. In patients who had an MDS of ≥9 months (n = 145; 87.9%), during 70.6% of the MDS time only ET had been administered. Patients who were naïve to ET more often had a good response to and a longer duration of palliative ET than those who were not. The nonpersistence rate was 4.3%.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Excluding the few patients who had a rapidly progressive course, the disease was controlled for about 70% of the entire palliative disease course with ET alone. Only very few patients were nonpersistent with ET and consciously stopped a still effective, ongoing ET.
authors.affiliation: Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, Cantonal Hospital Winterthur, Winterthur, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Uwe
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Güth
authors.forename: Dorothy Jane
authors.initials: DJ
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.forename: Andreas
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Schötzau
authors.forename: Seraina Margaretha
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Schmid
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D018931:Antineoplastic Agents, Hormonal / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D047072:Aromatase Inhibitors / Q000008:administration & dosage; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000473:pathology; D015331:Cohort Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D055118:Medication Adherence; D008875:Middle Aged; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D010166:Palliative Care / Q000379:methods*; D011960:Receptors, Estrogen / Q000032:analysis*; D011980:Receptors, Progesterone / Q000032:analysis*; D016019:Survival Analysis; D013629:Tamoxifen / Q000008:administration & dosage; D016896:Treatment Outcome
chemical_list: D018931:Antineoplastic Agents, Hormonal; D047072:Aromatase Inhibitors; D011960:Receptors, Estrogen; D011980:Receptors, Progesterone; D013629:Tamoxifen