Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2017 Mar 27:7:45411.
doi: 10.1038/srep45411.

Impact of molecular subtypes on metastatic breast cancer patients: a SEER population-based study

Yue Gong  1   2 , Yi-Rong Liu  1   2 , Peng Ji  1   2 , Xin Hu  1 , Zhi-Ming Shao  1   2   3
Affiliations

Impact of molecular subtypes on metastatic breast cancer patients: a SEER population-based study

Yue Gong et al. Sci Rep. .

Abstract

To investigate the significance and impact of molecular subtyping stratification on metastatic breast cancer patients, we identified 159,344 female breast cancer patients in the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) database with known hormone receptor (HoR) and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) status. 4.8% of patients were identified as having stage IV disease, and were more likely to be HER2+/HoR-, HER2+/HoR+, or HER2-/HoR-. Stage IV breast cancer patients with a HER2+/HoR+ status exhibited the highest median overall survival (OS) (44.0 months) and those with a HER2-/HoR- status exhibited the lowest median OS (13.0 months). Patients with a HER2-/HoR+ status had more bone metastasis, whereas patients with a HER2+/HoR- status had an increased incidence of liver metastasis. Brain and lung metastasis were more likely to occur in women with a HER2-/HoR- status. The multivariable analysis revealed a significant interaction between single metastasis and molecular subtype. No matter which molecular subtype, women who did not undergo primary tumour surgery had worse survival than those who experienced primary tumour surgery. Collectively, our findings advanced the understanding that molecular subtype might lead to more tailored and effective therapies in metastatic breast cancer patients.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing financial interests.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
(A,B) Overall and breast cancer-specific survival of stage IV patients according to molecular subtype. (C,D) Overall and breast cancer-specific survival of stage IV patients with single metastasis according to site of distant metastasis. (E) Distribution of single metastasis in stage IV patients with different molecular subtypes. P-value of all survival curves was less than 0.001.
Figure 2
Figure 2
(A,B) Overall and breast cancer-specific survival of stage IV patients who received primary tumor surgery or not. P-value of all survival curves was less than 0.001. (C) Forest plot of multivariate analysis for overall survival of stage IV patients with surgery or no surgery using the Cox regression model by adjusting for all other prognostic factors listed. The diamond denotes the HR of each subgroup. An HR > 1.0 indicates higher risk for overall mortality in the no surgery group and vice versa.
Figure 3
Figure 3. Flow diagram for selection of the study cohort.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Torre L. A. et al.. Global cancer statistics, 2012. CA-Cancer J Clin 65, 87–108 (2015). - PubMed
    1. DeSantis C. E. et al.. Breast cancer statistics, 2015: convergence of incidence rates between black and white women. CA-Cancer J Clin, 66, 31–42 (2016). - PubMed
    1. Carey L. A. et al.. Race, breast cancer subtypes, and survival in the Carolina Breast Cancer Study. JAMA 295, 2492–2502 (2006). - PubMed
    1. Perou C. M. et al.. Molecular portraits of human breast tumours. Nature 406, 747–752 (2000). - PubMed
    1. Fan C. et al.. Concordance among gene-expression–based predictors for breast cancer. N Engl J Med 355, 560–569 (2006). - PubMed

Publication types