SAN ANTONIO – Adding ovarian suppression to 5 years of either tamoxifen or exemestane following chemotherapy, in women with hormone receptor-positive early breast cancer, provided a markedly greater reduction in breast cancer recurrence compared with standard therapy with tamoxifen alone, Dr. Prudence Francis reported at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium.
However, not all premenopausal patients obtained benefit from ovarian suppression. Those who didn’t receive chemotherapy had excellent outcomes with 5 years of tamoxifen alone, with a 95.8% disease-free survival at 5 years. Dr. Francis, who is head of breast medical oncology at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Center, Melbourne, discusses in an interview how these key findings of SOFT (the Suppression of Ovarian Function Trial) should change practice in the clinic next week.