Vasco Fonseca
Centro Hospitalar Lisboa Ocidental, Portugal
Title: Do breast cancer units treat patients based on their own neoadjuvant protocols?
Biography
Biography: Vasco Fonseca
Abstract
In the CHLO Breast Unit, which incorporates 4 hospitals, we treat almost 300 new breast cancer patients per year. In most cases, the international guidelines are very clear regarding locally advanced breast cancer, allowing a vast number of options in the grey area that concerns the Unit’s experience. We consider that the Unit’s experience and tumor staging, but also tumor biology, patient’s preference, individual risk factors and relative contraindications should be the principal considerations for the neoadjuvant treatment decision (according to international data). For this reason, we have formulated an internal protocol which allows us, not only to include all the indicated patients, but also to compile a database for their follow-up. In our protocol, triple negative, Her2 positive tumors and luminal B-like with high proliferative index, equal or above 2 cm (cT2N0), are proposed for neoadjuvant treatment. Patients with hormone dependent tumors that refuse surgical treatment, older patients, or patients with severe comorbidities, as well as selected luminal-A-like patients, are included in neoadjuvant hormonal treatment, which in some cases is extended over 8 months.