The influence of age on treatment choice and survival of elderly breast cancer patients in south-eastern Netherlands: A population-based study

Pathologic and Clinical Characteristics of Elderly Patients With Breast Cancer: A Retrospective Analysis of a Multicenter Study (Anatolian Society of Medical Oncology)

“…Previous studies indicate that elderly patients are less likely to receive systemic therapy, while elderly patients are just as likely to receive endocrine therapy as younger patients. 2,8,[14][15] In the present study, the number of patients who received endocrine therapy increased significantly with age (30.3%, 36.3%, and 66.7% of patients 70-74 years old, 75-79 years old, and 80 years or older, respectively; P , 0.001), whereas there was a progressive decrease in the number of patients receiving chemotherapy according to age (69.8%, 63.7%, and 34.1%, respectively; P , 0.001). Because the frequency of presenting with ER and/or PR positive tumors increases in elderly patients, a greater proportion have been treated with adjuvant endocrine therapy.…”

Hormone Treatment without Surgery for Patients Aged 75 Years or Older with Operable Breast Cancer

“…They are also less likely to receive radiotherapy after breastconserving surgery. [1][2][3][4] Reasons given for the decision to refrain from standard local therapy in elderly breast cancer patients are comorbidity, patient preferences, reduced functional and mental status, and slowly progressive disease requiring less intensive treatment. [5][6][7] As an alternative to local therapy, physicians relatively often use tamoxifen or an aromatase inhibitor (AI) as the sole treatment for their elderly patients.…”

Position paper by the UKCCCR Elderly Cancer Patients in Clinical Trials Working Group

“…There is substantial evidence to indicate that, with a range of tumour types, given similar treatments, elderly patients have a relative survival similar to that of younger patients (Begg and Carbone, 1983;Dhodapkar et al, 1996;Siu et al, 1996). However, a number of studies have shown that elderly patients often have more advanced tumours at the time of diagnosis (Bergman et al, 1992;Busch et al, 1996;Goodwin et al, 1996) and receive less aggressive treatment (Newcomb and Carbone, 1993;August et al, 1994;Higtower et al, 1994;McKenna, 1994;Newschaffer et al, 1996) than their younger counterparts. Although most of these reports emanate from North America, it seems likely that a similar situation exists in the UK.…”