CTC count is an independent and quantitative prognostic factor in early breast cancer patients treated by NCT. It complements current prognostic models based on tumor characteristics and response to therapy.

Purpose: There is a need for sensitive, reproducible biomarkers for patients with stage III melanoma to guide clinical decision making. Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) can be detected in patients with melanoma; however, there are limited data regarding their significance in stage III disease. The aim of this study was to determine whether CTCs are associated with early relapse in stage III melanoma.Experimental Design: We prospectively assessed CTCs at first presentation in clinic (baseline) for 243 patients with stage III melanoma. CTCs were measured using the CellSearch System. Relapse-free survival (RFS) was compared between patients with one or more baseline CTC versus those with no CTCs. Log-rank test and Cox regression analysis were applied to establish associations of CTCs with RFS.Results: At least one baseline CTC was identified in 90 of 243 (37%) patients. Forty-five (19%), 67 (28%), 118 (49%), and 13 (5%) patients were stage IIIA, IIIB, IIIC, or IIID, respectively. CTC detection was not associated with substage, or primary tumor characteristics. Multivariable analysis demonstrated that the detection of ≥1 baseline CTC was significantly associated with decreased 6-month RFS [log-rank, P < 0.0001; HR, 3.62, 95% confidence interval (CI), 1.78-7.36; P < 0.0001] and 54-month RFS (log-rank, P ¼ 0.01; HR, 1.69; 95% CI, 1.13-2.54; P ¼ 0.01).Conclusions: ≥1 CTC was independently associated with melanoma relapse, suggesting that CTC assessment may be useful to identify patients at risk for relapse who could derive benefit from adjuvant therapy.

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Background Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) can be identified in approximately 25% of non-metastatic breast cancer patients (BC), and data are emerging regarding their prognostic significance. We hypothesized that CTCs identified prior to resection of the primary tumor would predict worse outcome in non-metastatic BC patients. Study Design We performed CTC enumerations on 509 patients with non-metastatic BC as part of an IRB approved study. CTCs (per 7.5 ml blood) were identified using the Cell Search® System (Janssen). The presence of ≥ 1 CTC meeting morphological criteria for malignancy was considered a positive result. Log-rank test and Cox regression analysis were applied to establish the association of CTCs with relapse-free and overall survival. Results Median follow-up was 48 months and mean age was 53 years. Fifty-nine percent of patients (299/509) had tumors >2cm, and 46% (234/509) had positive lymph nodes. One hundred sixty-six patients received neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NACT) prior to CTC assessment, and 343 patients were chemonaïve. One or more CTC was identified in 43/166 (26%) of NACT treated patients, and in 81/343 (24%) of chemonaïve patients. CTCs were not associated with tumor size, grade, or lymph node status (P= NS). Detection of one or more CTCs predicted decreased relapse-free (log-rank P<0.001, HR = 2.72, 95% CI, 1.57 to 4.72; P<0.001) and overall survival (log-rank P=0.02, HR = 2.29, 95% CI, 1.12 to 4.67; P = 0.03) at 48 months of follow-up. Conclusions One or more CTCs identified prior to resection of the primary breast tumor predicted worse relapse-free and overall survival, irrespective of primary tumor size, grade, or lymph node positivity.

BACKGROUND Obesity (BMI≥30) may be an etiologic and prognostic factor in inflammatory breast cancer (IBC). We examined the relationship between BMI, pathologic complete response (pCR), and circulating-tumor-cell (CTC) levels in IBC. METHODS Cohort included IBC patients diagnosed 2005–2015 who had neoadjuvant chemotherapy during a prospective trial on CTCs and pathologic review describing pCR. Chi-square, logistic regression, and Cox proportional hazards models were used to identify clinicopathologic associations with event-free survival (EFS). RESULTS Of 73 patients, 61 (84%) had CTC values, 22 (30%) achieved a pCR, and 39 (53%) were obese. There was no difference between obese and non-obese patients for pCR rates (31% vs. 29%, p=0.90) or presence of CTCs (23% vs. 26%, p=0.80). Among non-obese patients, CTCs were associated with worse EFS (HR 11.69, p<0.01), but among obese patients, there was no difference in EFS between those with and without CTCs. CONCLUSIONS BMI mediates CTCs’ prognostic significance in IBC.

Background We performed an international meta-analysis of individual patient data to assess the clinical validity of circulating tumor cell (CTC) count in non-metastatic breast cancer (BC) patients (pts) treated by neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NCT). Methods A protocol pre-specified the study objectives. We performed a literature & abstracts search up to Dec 2014, then contacted all centers deemed to have eligible data (published or not): early BC pts treated with NCT with CTC count by CellSearch®. The primary endpoint was overall survival (OS); secondary endpoints included distant disease-free survival (DDFS), locoregional relapse-free interval (LRFI) and pathological complete response (pCR). Non-overlapping CTC time points were: baseline (5-0 weeks before NCT), 1-8 weeks after NCT start, 5-0 weeks before surgery and 1-52 weeks after surgery. We used Cox regression models, stratified by study, and the landmark method to establish the prognostic value of CTC count/changes during treatment and survival. Results We collected 2,156 individual pt data from 21 studies and 16 centers worldwide. With ≥1/≥2/≥5 CTC/7.5ml as thresholds, CTC positivity rate was 25/13/6% at baseline, 17/6/3% after NCT start, 15/5/1% before surgery and 11/4/1% after surgery (decrease, p&lt;0.0001). Before NCT, ≥1 CTC was found in 19%, 22%, 24%, 29% and 41% of cT1, T2, T3, T4a-c and T4d BC, respectively (p&lt;0.0001) and was also marginally associated with hormone-receptors negativity (p=0.04). Later CTC detection rates were not associated with any of the baseline characteristics. pCR (assessed in 2,072 pts; ypT0/isN0 used as pCR definition in 92% of pts) was observed in 24% of pts but was not associated with CTC count, at any time point. 301, 418 and 157 events were reported for OS, DDFS and LRFI, respectively. In univariate analyses, ≥1 CTC at baseline was a prognostic factor for OS (HR=2.6 [1.9-3.4], p&lt;0.0001), DDFS (HR=2.4 [1.9-3.1], p&lt;0.0001) and -importantly- for LRFI (HR=1.8 [1.2-2.7], p=0.001). Similar results were obtained using other thresholds (≥2 & ≥5 CTC) and/or later time points (after NCT start, before surgery). There was no interaction between the prognostic impact of CTC count and tumor subtypes. Although rare, pts with persistently elevated CTC count (≥1CTC) before NCT and before surgery (5% of pts) had a worse OS than patients with persistently null CTC count (HR=6.2 [3.4-11], p&lt;0.0001). Finally, in multivariate analyses, baseline CTC detection (whatever the CTC threshold used : ≥1/≥2/≥5 CTC) was an independent prognostic factor for OS, DDFS and LRFI, together with pCR, cT, cN and tumor subtype, (e.g. for OS: CTC≥2 HR=4.2 [3.0-5.9] p&lt;0.0001, No pCR HR=6.2 [3.7-11] p&lt;0.0001, cT4d HR=2.6 [1.1-6.6] p=0.02, cN+ HR=1.7 [1.2-2.4] p=0.003, triple negative BC HR=3.2 [2.1-5.1]). Similar results were obtained with later time points (after NCT start, before surgery). Conclusions Our study demonstrates with the highest level of evidence that CTCs are a prognostic biomarker in early BC treated by NCT. This impact was independent to that of pCR and was observed on OS, DDFS and also -for the first time- on LRFI. CTC count can usefully complement standard prognostic factors and pCR to improve the prognostication of early BC pts. Citation Format: Bidard F-C, Michiels S, Mueller V, Riethdorf S, Esserman LJ, Lucci A, Naume B, Horiguchi J, Gisbert-Criado R, Sleijfer S, Toi M, Garcia-Saenz JA, Hartkopf A, Generali D, Rothe F, Smerage J, Muinelo L, Stebbing J, Viens P, Magbanua M, Hall CS, Engebråtenm O, Takata D, Vidal-Martínez J, Onstenk W, Fujisawa N, Diaz-Rubio E, Taran F-A, Cappelletti MR, Ignatiadis M, Name N, Proudhon C, Wolf D, Bowman Bauldry J, Borgen E, Nagaoka R, Carañana V, Kraan J, Maestro M, Brucker SY, Weber K, Reyal F, Amara D, Gopalkrishna Karhade M, Ruud Mathiesen R, Tokiniwa H, Llombart-Cussac A, D'Hollander K, Cottu P, Park JW, Loibl S, Pierga J-Y, Pantel K. IMENEO: International MEta-analysis of circulating tumor cell detection in early breast cancer patients treated by NEOadjuvant chemotherapy [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 2016 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium; 2016 Dec 6-10; San Antonio, TX. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2017;77(4 Suppl):Abstract nr S3-01.

<p>Box and Whisker Plots</p>

<p>Box and Whisker Plots</p>