Study: Benefits of Chemotherapy May Outweigh Side Effects

The benefits of chemotherapy for breast cancer may outweigh its side effects, especially for younger women, according to researchers at Dartmouth Medical School.

Prolonged chemotherapy has been found to substantially reduce the risk of disease relapse and death in breast cancer patient, but the toxic side effects have been a concern. Researchers wanted to determine whether the benefits of chemotherapy are enough to offset the side effects and justify its use.

Reporting in the Lancet, the researchers said they performed a statistical analysis using data from 47 randomized trials involving 18,000 women to measure the benefits of chemotherapy in terms of survival time adjusted for quality of life. Women given chemotherapy were compared with women who did not receive chemotherapy.

Within 10 years follow up time, researchers found that the benefit for younger patients (under 50 years old) who were given chemotherapy balanced the burdens of toxic side effects, especially for younger women who were not treated with tamoxifen.

Patients treated with chemotherapy who were younger gained an average of 10.3 months of relapse-free survival and 5.4 months of overall survival within 10 years compared with the patients who did not receive chemotherapy.

For older patients, chemotherapy also gave less but still substantial benefit compared to no chemotherapy. Average gains within 10 years for older women given chemotherapy were 6.8 months of relapse-free survival and 2.9 months of overall survival.

For older patients with estrogen-receptor-poor tumors who were not given tamoxifen, the quality-adjusted benefit of chemotherapy was similar to that for younger patients, according to the researchers.

"We conclude that within 10 years' follow-up, the benefits of adjuvant chemotherapy outweigh its burdens for younger women for a wide range of quality-of-life values for toxicity and relapse," said Barnard Cole, co-author of the study.

Other sources: The Lancet