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. 2017 Nov 9;17(1):106.
doi: 10.1186/s12905-017-0456-1.

Clinicopathologic and prognostic features of breast cancer in young women: a series from North of Morocco

Joaira Bakkach  1 , Mohamed Mansouri  2   3 , Touria Derkaoui  2 , Ali Loudiyi  3 , Mohamed Fihri  4 , Samia Hassani  2 , Amina Barakat  2 , Naima Ghailani Nourouti  2 , Mohcine Bennani Mechita  2
Affiliations

Clinicopathologic and prognostic features of breast cancer in young women: a series from North of Morocco

Joaira Bakkach et al. BMC Womens Health. .

Abstract

Background: Literature data reported a higher frequency of breast cancer in young women (BCYW) in developing countries. BCYW is associated with delayed diagnosis, aggressive biology and poor prognosis. However, our knowledge of biological profile, treatment received and outcome of young patients is still limited in Morocco. We propose to analyze clinicopathologic, therapeutic and prognostic features of BCYW among a series of patients native and/or inhabitant of North of Morocco.

Methods: We carried out a retro-prospective study of 331 infiltrating breast cancer cases registered between January 2010 and December 2015. Details of tumor pathology, treatment and outcome were collected. Disease-Free Survival (DFS) and Overall Survival (OS) were assessed by Kaplan-Meier analysis.

Results: A total of 82 patients were diagnosed with breast cancer at the age of 40 or younger (24.8%). Median age was 36 years. More than one quarter (26%) of patients had family history of breast or ovarian cancer. Advanced stages accounted for 34.2% of cases. Median tumor diameter was 2.8 cm. Intermediate and high-grade tumors represented 47.6% and 40.2%, respectively. Nodal involvement was present in 58.5% and lymphovascular invasion was found in 47.7% of the patients. About two thirds (66.2%) of tumors were hormone receptor positive, 29.2% over-expressed HER2 receptor and 23% were triple negative. Patients underwent breast conserving surgery in 38.2% of cases, 61.7% were offered adjuvant chemotherapy and 84.6% received hormone therapy. Five-year DFS and OS were respectively 88.9% and 75.6%. Locoregional recurrence occurred in 2.8% of cases and 8.3% of patients developed distant metastases.

Conclusion: Our findings are in accordance with previous studies that have shown a higher frequency of breast cancer among Moroccan young women. In line with literature data, clinicopathologic profile seems to be aggressive and prognosis is pejorative in our series.

Keywords: Aggressive biology; BRCA1; BRCA2; Breast cancer; Poor prognosis; Survival analysis; Young women.

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Conflict of interest statement

Ethics approval and consent to participate

The study was approved by the Ethics Committee for Biomedical Research of the Faculty of Medicine and Pharmacy of Rabat (CERB) registered under number IORG0006594. All participants gave a written informed consent to participate in the study.

Consent for publication

Not applicable for this study.

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Publisher’s Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Overall survival at 5 years for 82 patients
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Survival for 82 patients according to AJCC stages, pvalue = 0.001
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Disease-free survival at 5 years for non-metastatic patients
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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