Optimal treatment outcomes for breast cancer are dependent on a timely diagnosis followed by an organized, multidisciplinary approach to care. However, in many low-and middle-income countries, effective care management pathways can be difficult to follow because of financial constraints, a lack of resources, an insufficiently trained workforce, and/or poor infrastructure. On the basis of prior work by the Breast Health Global Initiative, this article proposes a phased implementation strategy for developing sustainable approaches to enhancing patient care in limited-resource settings by creating roadmaps that are individualized and adapted to the baseline environment. This strategy proposes that, after a situational analysis, implementation phases begin with bolstering palliative care capacity, especially in settings where a late-stage diagnosis is common. This is followed by strengthening the patient pathway, with consideration given to a dynamic balance between centralization of services into centers of excellence to achieve better quality and decentralization of services to increase patient access. The use of resource checklists ensures that comprehensive therapy or palliative care can be delivered safely and effectively. Episodic or continuous monitoring with established process and quality metrics facilitates ongoing assessment, which should drive continual process improvements. A series of case studies provides a snapshot of country experiences with enhancing patient care, including the implementation of national cancer control plans in Kenya, palliative care in Romania, the introduction of a 1-stop clinic for diagnosis in Brazil, the surgical management of breast cancer in India, and the establishment of a women's cancer center in Ghana. Cancer 2020;126:2365-2378.

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BackgroundThe role of estrogen receptor beta (ER-β) in breast cancer (BC) remains unclear. Some studies have suggested that ER-β may oppose the actions of estrogen receptor alpha (ER-α), and clinical evidence has indicated that the loss of ER-β expression is associated with a poor prognosis and resistance to endocrine therapy. The objective of the present study was to determine the role of ER-β and the ER-α/ER-β ratio in predicting the response to endocrine therapy and whether different regimens have any effect on ER-β expression levels.MethodsNinety postmenopausal patients with primary BC were recruited for a short-term double-blinded randomized prospective controlled study. To determine tumor cell proliferation, we measured the expression of Ki67 in tumor biopsy samples taken before and after 26 days of treatment with anastrozole 1 mg/day (N = 25), tamoxifen 20 mg/day (N = 24) or placebo (N = 29) of 78 participants. The pre- and post-samples were placed in tissue microarray blocks and submitted for immunohistochemical assay. Biomarker statuses (ER-β, ER-α and Ki67) were obtained by comparing each immunohistochemical evaluation of the pre- and post-surgery samples using the semi-quantitative Allred’s method. Statistical analyses were performed using an ANOVA and Spearman’s correlation coefficient tests, with significance at p ≤ 0.05.ResultsThe frequency of ER-β expression did not change after treatment (p = 0.33). There were no significant changes in Ki67 levels in ER-β-negative cases (p = 0.45), but in the ER-β-positive cases, the anastrozole (p = 0.01) and tamoxifen groups (p = 0.04) presented a significant reduction in post-treatment Ki67 scores. There was a weak but positive correlation between the ER-α and ER-β expression levels. Only patients with an ER-α/ER-β expression ratio between 1 and 1.5 demonstrated significant differences in Ki67 levels after treatment with anastrozole (p = 0.005) and tamoxifen (p = 0.026).ConclusionsOur results provide additional data that indicate that the measurement of ER-β in BC patients may help predict tamoxifen and anastrozole responsiveness in the neoadjuvant setting. These effects of hormonal treatment appear to be dependent on the ratio of ER-α/ER-β expression.Trial registrationCurrent Controlled Trials ISRCTN89801719