The economic burden of metastatic breast cancer: a systematic review of literature from developed countries

A cost-effectiveness analysis of capecitabine maintenance therapy versus routine follow-up for early-stage triple-negative breast cancer patients after standard treatment from a perspective of Chinese society

BACKGROUND

Capecitabine maintenance therapy is safe and efficacious for early-stage triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) patients, but the cost-effectiveness of its long-term use has not been investigated. Here, we evaluated the cost-effectiveness of capecitabine maintenance therapy, compared with routine follow-up, in early-stage TNBC patients after standard treatment from a perspective of Chinese society.

METHODS

A three-state Markov model based on the data from the SYSUCC-001 trial was constructed to estimate the cost-effectiveness of capecitabine maintenance therapy in a month cycle over a period of 30-year time horizon. A 5% annual discount rate was set for all costs and benefits. One-way and probabilistic sensitivity analyses were performed to explore the model uncertainties. The main outcomes include quality-adjusted life years (QALYs), incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER), and the number needed to treat (NNT) to prevent one additional event.

RESULTS

Compared with routine follow-up, 1-year capecitabine maintenance therapy yielded an additional 1.29 quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) at an additional cost of $3391.70, with an ICER of $2630.53 (95% CI: $1159.81-$5090.12) per QALY gained. The ICER was considerably lower than the recommended willingness-to-pay (WTP) threshold (i.e., $28,130.00 per QALY). The results were sensitive to the discount rate, drug cost, and treatment cost after relapse. Further, the NNT to prevent one additional relapse case was 29.2 (95% CI: 13.2-196.6), 16.7 (95% CI: 8.4-111.6), and 12.0 (95% CI: 5.7-82.6) at 1, 2, and 5 years, respectively.

CONCLUSIONS

One-year capecitabine maintenance therapy for early-stage TNBC after standard treatment, compared with routine follow-up, was found to be highly cost-effective with promising clinical benefits and acceptable increased costs. Real-world studies are warranted to validate our findings in the future.

Utility values and its time to deterioration in breast cancer patients after diagnosis and during treatments

BACKGROUND

The potential effects of breast cancer (BC) on health-related quality of life (HRQoL) should be considered in clinical and policy decision-making, as the economic burden of BC management is currently assessed. In the last decades, time-to-HRQoL score deterioration (TTD) has been proposed as an approach to the analysis of longitudinal HRQoL in oncology. The main objectives of the current study were to investigate the evolution of the utility values in BC patients after diagnosis and during follow-ups and to evaluate the TTD in utility values among women in all stages of BC.

METHODS

Health-state utility values (HSUV) were assessed using the EuroQol 5-Dimension 3-Level at diagnosis, at the end of the first hospitalization and 3 and 6 months after the first hospitalization. For a given baseline score, HSUV was considered to have deteriorated if this score decreased by ≥ 0.08 points of the EQ-5D utility index score and ≥ 7 points of the EQ visual analogue scale. TTD curves were calculated using the Kaplan-Meier estimation method.

RESULTS

Overall 381 patients were enrolled between February 2006 and February 2008. The highest proportions of respondents at the baseline and all follow-ups reporting some and extreme problems were in pain discomfort and anxiety/depression dimensions; more than 80% of patients experienced a deterioration in EQ-5D utility index score and EQ VAS score with a median TTD of 3.15 months and 6.24 Months, respectively.

CONCLUSIONS

BC patients undergoing therapy need psychological support to cope with their discomfort, pain, depression, anxiety, and fear during the process of diagnosis and treatment to improve their QoL.

Response monitoring in metastatic breast cancer: a comparison of survival times between FDG-PET/CT and CE-CT

BACKGROUND

We compared overall survival for metastatic breast cancer (MBC) patients monitored with CE-CT, FDG-PET/CT or a combination of them in an observational setting.

METHODS

Patients with biopsy-verified (recurrent or de novo) MBC (n = 300) who were treated at Odense university hospital (Denmark) and response monitored with FDG-PET/CT (n = 83), CE-CT (n = 144), or a combination of these (n = 73) were followed until 2019. Survival was compared between the scan groups, and were adjusted for clinico-histopathological variables representing potential confounders in a Cox proportional-hazard regression model.

RESULTS

The study groups were mostly comparable regarding baseline characteristics, but liver metastases were reported more frequently in CE-CT group (38.9%) than in FDG-PET/CT group (19.3%) and combined group (24.7%). Median survival was 30.0 months for CE-CT group, 44.3 months for FDG-PET/CT group and 54.0 months for Combined group. Five-year survival rates were significantly higher for FDG-PET/CT group (41.9%) and combined group (43.3%), than for CE-CT group (15.8%). Using the CE-CT group as reference, the hazard ratio was 0.44 (95% CI: 0.29-0.68, P = 0.001) for the FDG-PET/CT group after adjusting for baseline characteristics. FDG-PET/CT detected the first progression 4.7 months earlier than CE-CT, leading to earlier treatment change.

CONCLUSIONS

In this single-center, observational study, patients with metastatic breast cancer who were response monitored with FDG-PET/CT alone or in combination with CE-CT had longer overall survival than patients monitored with CE-CT alone. Confirmation of these findings by further, preferably randomised clinical trials is warranted.

Variability of cost trajectories over the last year of life in patients with advanced breast cancer in the Netherlands

Objective

In breast cancer patients, treatment at the end of life accounts for a major share of medical spending. However, little is known about the variability of cost trajectories between patients. This study aims to identify underlying latent groups of advanced breast cancer patients with similar cost trajectories over the last year before death.

Methods

Data from deceased advanced breast cancer patients, diagnosed between 2010 and 2017, were retrieved from the Southeast Netherlands Advanced Breast Cancer (SONABRE) Registry. Costs of hospital care over the last twelve months before death were analyzed, and the variability of longitudinal patterns between patients were explored using group-based trajectory modeling. Descriptive statistics and multinomial logistic regression were applied to investigate differences between the identified latent groups.

Results

We included 558 patients. Over the last twelve months before death, mean hospital costs were €2,255 (SD = €492) per month. Costs increased over the last five months and reached a maximum of €3,614 in the last month of life, driven by hospital admissions, while spending for medication declined over the last three months of life. Based on patients’ individual cost trajectories, we identified six latent groups with distinct longitudinal patterns, of which only two showed a marked increase in costs over the last twelve months before death. Latent groups were constituted of heterogeneous patients, and clinical characteristics explained membership only to a limited extent.

Conclusions

The average costs of advanced breast cancer patients increased towards the end of life. However, we uncovered several latent groups of patients with divergent cost trajectories, which did not reflect the overall increasing trend. The mechanisms underlying the variability in cost trajectories warrants further research.

Identification of Genes with Prognostic Value in the Breast Cancer Microenvironment Using Bioinformatics Analysis

BACKGROUND Stromal and immune cells play essential roles in the development of breast cancer (BC). This study was conducted to identify prognosis-related genes from the tumor microenvironment. MATERIAL AND METHODS The gene expression profiles of 622 BC samples were downloaded from TCGA (The Cancer Genome Atlas) database. Stromal and immune scores were calculated by using the ESTIMATE (Estimation of STromal and Immune cells in MAlignant Tumours using Expression data) algorithm. Then, differentially expressed genes (DEGs) between the high score group and the low score group were screened. The intersecting DEGs were selected through Venn diagrams, and survival analysis was conducted. Functional and pathway enrichment analyses were performed using the DAVID (Database for Annotation, Visualization and Integrated Discovery), and a protein-protein interaction (PPI) network was constructed with the STRING database and Cytoscape. These genes were validated for prognostic value by use of the KM (Kaplan-Meier) plotter tool. RESULTS The low immune score group was associated with a poor prognosis. However, there was no difference in the prognosis between the high and low stromal score groups. A total of 248 intersecting DEGs were found in BC, and 61 genes were significantly associated with the prognosis of BC patients in the TCGA database. These genes were enriched in the immune response, components of the plasma membrane, and receptor activity. Furthermore, in the validation group, 31 of 61 genes were significantly associated with prognosis. CONCLUSIONS Our bioinformatics analysis identified 31 tumor microenvironment-related genes as potential prognostic predictors for breast cancer patients. Some of these genes that have not been widely investigated previously, such as CXCL9, GPR18, S1PR4, SASH3, and PYH1N1, might be additional predictive factors for BC patients.

Bioinformatics Identified 17 Immune Genes as Prognostic Biomarkers for Breast Cancer: Application Study Based on Artificial Intelligence Algorithms

An increasing body of evidence supports the association of immune genes with tumorigenesis and prognosis of breast cancer (BC). This research aims at exploring potential regulatory mechanisms and identifying immunogenic prognostic markers for BC, which were used to construct a prognostic signature for disease-free survival (DFS) of BC based on artificial intelligence algorithms. Differentially expressed immune genes were identified between normal tissues and tumor tissues. Univariate Cox regression identified potential prognostic immune genes. Thirty-four transcription factors and 34 immune genes were used to develop an immune regulatory network. The artificial intelligence survival prediction system was developed based on three artificial intelligence algorithms. Multivariate Cox analyses determined 17 immune genes (ADAMTS8, IFNG, XG, APOA5, SIAH2, C2CD2, STAR, CAMP, CDH19, NTSR1, PCDHA1, AMELX, FREM1, CLEC10A, CD1B, CD6, and LTA) as prognostic biomarkers for BC. A prognostic nomogram was constructed on these prognostic genes. Concordance indexes were 0.782, 0.734, and 0.735 for 1-, 3-, and 5- year DFS. The DFS in high-risk group was significantly worse than that in low-risk group. Artificial intelligence survival prediction system provided three individual mortality risk predictive curves based on three artificial intelligence algorithms. In conclusion, comprehensive bioinformatics identified 17 immune genes as potential prognostic biomarkers, which might be potential candidates of immunotherapy targets in BC patients. The current study depicted regulatory network between transcription factors and immune genes, which was helpful to deepen the understanding of immune regulatory mechanisms for BC cancer. Two artificial intelligence survival predictive systems are available at https://zhangzhiqiao7.shinyapps.io/Smart_Cancer_Survival_Predictive_System_16_BC_C1005/ and https://zhangzhiqiao8.shinyapps.io/Gene_Survival_Subgroup_Analysis_16_BC_C1005/. These novel artificial intelligence survival predictive systems will be helpful to improve individualized treatment decision-making.

Frequency of BRCA1 and BRCA2 Mutations in Individuals with Breast and Ovarian Cancer in a Chinese Hakka Population Using Next-Generation Sequencing

BACKGROUND

It is necessary to investigate the frequency of BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutations in Hakka populations due to the variations in breast cancer epidemiology and genetics.

METHODS

359 breast cancer patients and 66 ovarian cancer patients were included in this retrospective clinical study. Mutations of BRCA1 and BRCA2 were detected in blood samples by semiconductor sequencing.

RESULTS

The sensitivity of tumor markers including CEA, CA15-3, CA12-5, and CA199 for screening breast cancer was 16.44, 15.11, 8.44, and 7.56%, the combination of these 4 tumor markers reached the highest sensitivity index (31.11%). For ovarian cancer, the tumor markers were CA12-5 (54.05%), HE-4 (54.05%), CA72-4 (51.35%), and CEA (2.70%) in order of decreasing sensitivity. Moreover, the combination of these 4 tumor markers has the best sensitivity (75.68%) for screening ovarian cancer. In breast cancer patients, we found 5 (1.39%) patients with mutations in BRCA1, 13 (3.62%) mutations in BRCA2, and the total carrier rate is 5.01% (18/359). For ovarian cancer patients, the corresponding results were 3 (4.54%) mutations, 2 (3.03%) mutations, and 7.58% (5/66), respectively. The proportion of BRCA mutations was 5.41% (23/425) in breast and ovarian cancer patients of a Hakka population. The pathogenic, likely pathogenic, and benign mutations, and mutations of uncertain significance in this study mainly occurred in exon 14 of the BRCA1 gene, and exon 10 and exon 11 of the BRCA2 gene.

CONCLUSIONS

Understanding the spectrum and frequency of BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutations in a Hakka population will assist in the prevention and control of hereditary breast and ovarian cancers in this population.

Systematic reviews as a "lens of evidence": Determinants of cost-effectiveness of breast cancer screening

Systematic reviews with economic components are important decision tools for stakeholders seeking to evaluate technologies, such as breast cancer screening (BCS) programs. This overview of systematic reviews explores the determinants of the cost-effectiveness of BCS and assesses the quality of secondary evidence. The search identified 30 systematic reviews that reported on the determinants of the cost-effectiveness of BCS, including the costs of breast cancer and BCS. While the quality of the reviews varied widely, only four out of 30 papers were considered to be of a high quality. We did not identify publication bias in the original evidence on the cost-effectiveness of mammography screening; however, we highlight a need for improved clarity in both reporting and data verification. The reviews consisted mainly of studies from high-income countries. Breast cancer costs varied widely among the studies. Factors leading to higher costs included: time (diagnosis and last months before death), later stage or metastases, recurrence of the disease, age below 64 years and type of follow-up (more intensive or more specialized). Overall, screening with mammography was considered cost-effective in the age range 50-69 years in Western European and Northern American countries but not for older or younger women. Its cost-effectiveness was questionable for low-income settings and Asia. Mammography screening was more cost-effective with biennial screening compared to annual screening and single reading using computer-aided detection vs double reading. No information on the cost-effectiveness of ultrasonography was found, and there is much uncertainty on the cost-effectiveness of CBE because of methodological limitations.

Prognostic nomogram based on immune scores for breast cancer patients

Background

Increased attention has been focused on cancer immunity gene signature. However, the threshold of immune scores to predict disease‐free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) in breast cancer has not yet been defined. This study aimed to explore the association of immune scores with prognosis and build a clinical nomogram to predict the survival of patients with breast cancer.

Methods

A total of 986 subjects were analyzed, and clinicopathological characteristics and immune scores were obtained from the TCGA database. Cox proportional hazards regression model was used to estimate the adjusted hazard ratios (HRs). Based on results of multivariate analysis, nomograms were built. The models were subjected to bootstrap internal validation. The predictive accuracy and discriminative ability were measured by concordance index (C‐index) and the calibration curve.

Results

The patients were divided into three subgroups according to their immune scores. We found that compared with patients with low immune scores, those with intermediate and high immune scores had significantly improved DFS (HR and 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.439 [0.242‐0.799], 0.541 [0.343‐0.855], respectively), whereas only intermediate immune scores significantly indicated better OS (HR and 95% CI: 0.385 [0.163‐0.910]). The C‐index for DFS and OS prediction was 0.723 (95% CI, 0.661‐0.785) and 0.800 (95% CI, 0.724‐0.877), respectively. The calibration curves for probability of 3‐ and 5‐year DFS showed significant agreement between nomogram predictions and the actual observations.

Conclusions

High and/or intermediate immune scores are significantly correlated with better DFS and OS in patients with breast cancer. Moreover, the nomograms for predicting prognosis may help to estimate the survival of patients.

An updated systematic review of the cost-effectiveness of therapies for metastatic breast cancer

PURPOSE

The goal of this systematic review is to provide an update to the review by Pouwels et al. by conducting a systematic review and an assessment of the reporting quality of the economic analyses conducted since 2014.

METHODS

This systematic review identified published articles focused on metastatic breast cancer treatment using the Medline/PubMed and Scopus databases and the following search criteria: (((cost effectiveness[MeSH Terms]) OR (cost effectiveness) OR (cost-effectiveness) OR (cost utility) OR (cost-utility) OR (economic evaluation)) AND (("metastatic breast cancer") OR ("advanced breast cancer"))). The reporting quality of the included articles was evaluated using the International Society of Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research (ISPOR) Consolidated Health Economic Evaluation Reporting Standards (CHEERS) checklist.

RESULTS

Of the 256 identified articles, 67 of the articles were published after October 2014 when the prior systematic review stopped its assessment (Pouwels et al. in Breast Cancer Res Treat 165:485-498, 2017). From the 67 articles, we narrowed down to include 17 original health economic analyses specific to metastatic or advanced breast cancer. These articles were diverse with respect to methods employed and interventions included.

CONCLUSION

Although each of the articles contributed their own analytic strengths and limitations, the overall quality of the studies was moderate. The review demonstrated that the vast majority of the reported incremental cost-effectiveness ratios exceeded the typically employed willingness to pay thresholds used in each country of analysis. Only three of the reviewed articles studied chemotherapies rather than treatments targeting either HER2 or hormone receptors, demonstrating a gap in the literature.

The economic burden of metastatic breast cancer in Spain

Objectives

The study aimed to estimate the burden of metastatic breast cancer (mBC) in Spain over 5 years.

Methods

An incidence-based cost-of-illness model was developed in which a cohort of patients with mBC was followed from the diagnosis of metastatic disease over 5 years or death. Resource use data were collected through a physician survey conducted with 10 clinical experts in Spain. The model distinguished patients according to HER2 and hormonal receptor (HR) status, and followed the patient cohort in monthly cycles.

Results

The incident cohort was estimated to be 2,923 patients with mBC, consisting of 1,575 HER2-/HR+, 520 HER2+/HR+, 324 HER2+/HR-, and 503 triple negative patients. The estimated mean survival over the 5-year time period was 2.51 years, on average, with longer survival of 3.36 years for HER2+/HR+, 2.41 years for HER2-/HR+, 2.82 years for HER2+/HR- and shortest mean survival of 1.74 years for triple negative patients. The total costs were €469,92,731 for the overall population, €190,079,787 for the HER2-/HR+, €151,045,260 for the HER2+/HR+, €80,827,171 for the HER2+/HR- and €47,540,512 for the triple negative subgroups over 5 years. Per patient total costs were €160,642 on average, €120,664 for HER2-/HR+, €290,346 for HER2+/HR+, €249,152 for HER2+/HR-and €94,572 for triple negative patients over 5 years.

Conclusions

The economic burden of mBC in Spain is significant, but differs by HER2 and HR status. HER2-/HR +patients account for the highest burden due to the prevalence of this category, but HER2+/HR +patients have the highest per patient costs.

Cost-effectiveness of different strategies to prevent breast and ovarian cancer in German women with a BRCA 1 or 2 mutation

BACKGROUND

Women with a BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutation are at increased risk of developing breast and/or ovarian cancer. This economic modeling study evaluated different preventive interventions for 30-year-old women with a confirmed BRCA (1 or 2) mutation.

METHODS

A Markov model was developed to estimate the costs and benefits [i.e., quality-adjusted life years (QALYs), and life years gained (LYG)] associated with prophylactic bilateral mastectomy (BM), prophylactic bilateral salpingo-oophorectomy (BSO), BM plus BSO, BM plus BSO at age 40, and intensified surveillance. Relevant input data was obtained from a large German database including 5902 women with BRCA 1 or 2, and from the literature. The analysis was performed from the German Statutory Health Insurance (SHI) perspective. In order to assess the robustness of the results, deterministic and probabilistic sensitivity analyses were performed.

RESULTS

With costs of €29,434 and a gain in QALYs of 17.7 (LYG 19.9), BM plus BSO at age 30 was less expensive and more effective than the other strategies, followed by BM plus BSO at age 40. Women who were offered the surveillance strategy had the highest costs at the lowest gain in QALYs/LYS. In the probabilistic sensitivity analysis, the probability of cost-saving was 57% for BM plus BSO. At a WTP of 10,000 € per QALY, the probability of the intervention being cost-effective was 80%.

CONCLUSIONS

From the SHI perspective, undergoing BM plus immediate BSO should be recommended to BRCA 1 or 2 mutation carriers due to its favorable comparative cost-effectiveness.

Reviewing the quality, health benefit and value for money of chemotherapy and targeted therapy for metastatic breast cancer

Purpose

To provide an overview of model characteristics and outcomes of model-based economic evaluations concerning chemotherapy and targeted therapy (TT) for metastatic breast cancer (MBC); to assess the quality of the studies; to analyse the association between model characteristics and study quality and outcomes.

Methods

PubMED and NHS EED were systematically searched. Inclusion criteria were as follows: English or Dutch language, model-based economic evaluation, chemotherapy or TT as intervention, population diagnosed with MBC, published between 2000 and 2014, reporting life years (LY) or quality-adjusted life-year (QALY) and an incremental cost-effectiveness ratio. General characteristics, model characteristics and outcomes of the studies were extracted. Quality of the studies was assessed through a checklist.

Results

24 studies were included, considering 50 comparisons (20 concerning chemotherapy and 30 TT). Seven comparisons were represented in multiple studies. A health state-transition model including the following health states: stable/progression-free disease, progression and death was used in 18 studies. Studies fulfilled on average 14 out of the 26 items of the quality checklist, mostly due to a lack of transparency in reporting. Thirty-one per cent of the incremental net monetary benefit was positive. TT led to higher iQALY gained, and industry-sponsored studies reported more favourable cost-effectiveness outcomes.

Conclusions

The development of a disease-specific reference model would improve the transparency and quality of model-based cost-effectiveness assessments for MBC treatments. Incremental health benefits increased over time, but were outweighed by the increased treatment costs. Consequently, increased health benefits led to lower value for money.

Electronic supplementary material

The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s10549-017-4374-6) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Cost-utility analyses of drug therapies in breast cancer: a systematic review

The economic evaluation (EE) of health care products has become a necessity. Their quality must be high in order to trust the results and make informed decisions. While cost-utility analyses (CUAs) should be preferred to cost-effectiveness analyses in the oncology area, the quality of breast cancer (BC)-related CUA has been given little attention so far. Thus, firstly, a systematic review of published CUA related to drug therapies for BC, gene expression profiling, and HER2 status testing was performed. Secondly, the quality of selected CUA was assessed and the factors associated with a high-quality CUA identified. The systematic literature search was conducted in PubMed, MEDLINE/EMBASE, and Cochrane to identify published CUA between 2000 and 2014. After screening and data extraction, the quality of each selected CUA was assessed by two independent reviewers, using the checklist proposed by Drummond et al. The analysis of factors associated with a high-quality CUA (defined as a Drummond score ≥7) was performed using a two-step approach. Our systematic review was based on 140 CUAs and showed a wide variety of methodological approaches, including differences in the perspective adopted, the time horizon, measurement of cost and effectiveness, and more specially health-state utility values (HSUVs). The median Drummond score was 7 [range 3-10]. Only one in two of the CUA (n = 74) had a Drummond score ≥7, synonymous of "high quality." The statistically significant predictors of a high-quality CUA were article with "gene expression profiling" topic (p = 0.001), consulting or pharmaceutical company as main location of first author (p = 0.004), and articles with both incremental cost-utility ratio and incremental cost-effectiveness ratio as outcomes of EE (p = 0.02). Our systematic review identified only 140 CUAs published over the past 15 years with one in two of high quality. It showed a wide variety of methodological approaches, especially focused on HSUVs. A critical appraisal of utility values is necessary to better understand one of the main difficulties encountered by authors and propose areas for improvement to increase the quality of CUA. Since the last 5 years, there is a tendency toward an improvement in the quality of these studies, probably coupled with economic context, a better and widely spreading of recommendations and thus appropriation by medical practitioners. That being said, there is an urgent need for mandatory use of European and international recommendations to ensure quality of such approaches and to allow easy comparison.

A review of systematic reviews of the cost-effectiveness of hormone therapy, chemotherapy, and targeted therapy for breast cancer

Breast cancer is a global health concern. In fact, breast cancer is the primary cause of death among women worldwide and constitutes the most expensive malignancy to treat. As health care resources are finite, decisions regarding the adoption and coverage of breast cancer treatments are increasingly being based on "value for money," i.e., cost-effectiveness. As the evidence about the cost-effectiveness of breast cancer treatments is abundant, therefore difficult to navigate, systematic reviews of published systematic reviews offer the advantage of bringing together the results of separate systematic reviews in a single report. As a consequence, this paper presents an overview of systematic reviews of the cost-effectiveness of hormone therapy, chemotherapy, and targeted therapy for breast cancer to inform policy and reimbursement decision-making. A systematic review was conducted of published systematic reviews documenting cost-effectiveness analyses of breast cancer treatments from 2000 to 2014. Systematic reviews identified through a literature search of health and economic databases were independently assessed against inclusion and exclusion criteria. Systematic reviews of original evaluations were included only if they targeted breast cancer patients and specific breast cancer treatments (hormone therapy, chemotherapy, and targeted therapy only), documented incremental cost-effectiveness ratios, and were reported in the English language. The search strategy used a combination of these key words: "breast cancer," "systematic review/meta-analysis," and "cost-effectiveness/economics." Data were extracted using predefined extraction forms and qualitatively appraised using the assessment of multiple systematic reviews (AMSTAR) tool. The literature search resulted in 511 bibliographic records, of which ten met our inclusion criteria. Five reviews were conducted in the early-stage breast cancer setting and five reviews in the metastatic setting. In early-stage breast cancer, evidence about trastuzumab value differed by age. Trastuzumab was cost-effective only in women with HER2-positive breast cancer younger than 65 years and over a life-time horizon. The cost-effectiveness of trastuzumab in HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer yielded conflicting results. The same conclusions were reached in comparisons between vinorelbine and taxanes. In both early stage and advanced/metastatic breast cancer, newer aromatase inhibitors (AIs) have proved cost-effective compared to older treatments. This overview of systematic reviews shows that there is heterogeneity in the evidence concerning the cost-effectiveness of hormone therapy, chemotherapy, and targeted therapy for breast cancer. The cost-effectiveness of these treatments depends not only on the comparators but the context, i.e., adjuvant or metastatic setting, subtype of patient population, and perspective adopted. Decisions involving the cost-effectiveness of breast cancer treatments could be made easier and more transparent by better harmonizing the reporting of economic evaluations assessing the value of these treatments.

Thymoquinone in the clinical treatment of cancer: Fact or fiction?

Thymoquinone (TQ) is the bioactive phytochemical constituent of the seeds oil of Nigella sativa. In vitro and in vivo research has thoroughly investigated the anticancer effects of TQ against several cancer cell lines and animal models. As a result, a considerable amount of information has been generated from research thus providing a better understanding of the anti-proliferating activity of this compound. Therefore, it is appropriate that TQ should move from testing on the bench to clinical experiments. The purpose of this review is to highlight the potential of TQ as an anticancer agent and the chances of this compound in the clinical treatment of cancer, with special attention on breast cancer treatment.

Treatment patterns, clinical outcomes and health care costs associated with HER2-positive breast cancer with central nervous system metastases: a French multicentre observational study

BACKGROUND

The population of patients with human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)-positive breast cancer (BC) who develop central nervous system (CNS) metastases is growing. Treatment strategies in this population are highly diverse. The objective of the study was to assess health care costs for the management of HER2 positive BC with CNS metastases.

METHODS

This multicentre, retrospective, observational study was conducted on HER2-positive BC patients diagnosed with CNS metastases between 2006 and 2008. Data were extracted from patient medical records to estimate health care resource use. A partitioned estimator was used to adjust censoring costs by use of the Kaplan-Meier survival estimate.

RESULTS

218 patients were included and costs were estimated for 200 patients. The median time to detection of CNS metastases was 37.6 months. The first metastatic event involved the CNS in 39 patients, and this was the unique first metastatic site in 31 of these patients. Two years following diagnosis of CNS metastases, 70.3% of patients had died. The mean per capita cost of HER2-positive BC with CNS metastases in the first year following diagnosis was €35,735 [95% CI: 31,716-39,898]. The proportion of costs attributed to expensive drugs and those arising from hospitalisation were in the same range.

CONCLUSION

A range of individualised disease management strategies are used in HER2-positive BC patients with CNS metastases and the treatments used in the first months following diagnosis are expensive. The understanding of cost drivers may help optimise healthcare expenditure and inform the development of appropriate prevention policies.

Hospital visits among women with skeletal-related events secondary to breast cancer and bone metastases: a nationwide population-based cohort study in Denmark

Objective

Skeletal-related events (SREs) among women with breast cancer may be associated with considerable use of health-care resources. We characterized inpatient and outpatient hospital visits in a national population-based cohort of Danish women with SREs secondary to breast cancer and bone metastases.

Methods

We identified first-time breast cancer patients with bone metastases from 2003 through 2009 who had a subsequent SRE (defined as pathologic fracture, spinal cord compression, radiation therapy, or surgery to bone). Hospital visits included the number of inpatient hospitalizations, length of stay, number of hospital outpatient clinic visits, and emergency room visits. The number of hospital visits was assessed for a pre-SRE period (90 days prior to the diagnostic period), a diagnostic period (14 days prior to the SRE), and a post-SRE period (90 days after the SRE). Patients who experienced more than one SRE during the 90-day post-SRE period were defined as having multiple SREs and were followed until 90 days after the last SRE.

Results

We identified 569 women with SREs secondary to breast cancer with bone metastases. The majority of women had multiple SREs (73.1%). A total of 20.9% and 33.4% of women with single and multiple SREs died in the post-SRE period, respectively. SREs were associated with a large number of hospital visits in the diagnostic period, irrespective of the number and type of SREs. Women with multiple SREs generally had a higher number of visits compared to those with a single SRE in the post-SRE period, eg, median length of hospitalization was 5 days (interquartile range 0–15) for women with a single SRE and 13 days (interquartile range 4–30) for women with multiple SREs.

Conclusion

SREs secondary to breast cancer and bone metastases were associated with substantial use of hospital resources.

DM-1, sodium 4-[5-(4-hydroxy-3-methoxyphenyl)-3-oxo-penta-1,4-dienyl]-2-methoxy-phenolate: a curcumin analog with a synergic effect in combination with paclitaxel in breast cancer treatment

This paper describes a new method for the preparation of sodium 4-[5-(4-hydroxy-3-methoxyphenyl)-3-oxo-penta-1,4-dienyl]-2-methoxy-phenolate, DM-1, and 3-oxo-penta-1,4-dienyl-bis (2-methoxy-phenolate), DM-2. The aim of this work was to evaluate the antitumor effects of DM-1 in adjuvant chemotherapy for breast cancer treatment. Mice bearing mammary adenocarcinomas (Ehrlich ascites tumors) were treated with paclitaxel alone, DM-1 alone, and paclitaxel + DM-1. Tumor samples were used to perform cytological analysis by the Papanicolaou method and apoptosis analysis by annexin V and phosphorylated caspase 3. The paclitaxel + DM-1 group had decreased tumor areas and tumor volumes, and the frequency of metastasis was significantly reduced. This caused a decrease in cachexia, which is usually caused by the tumor. Furthermore, treatment with paclitaxel + DM-1 and DM-1 alone increased the occurrence of apoptosis up to 40% in tumor cells, which is 35% more than in the group treated with paclitaxel alone. This cell death was mainly caused through phosphorylated caspase 3 (11% increase in paclitaxel + DM-1 compared to the paclitaxel group), as confirmed by reduced malignancy criteria in the ascitic fluid. DM-1 emerges as a potential treatment for breast cancer and may act as an adjuvant in chemotherapy, enhancing antitumor drug activity with reduced side effects.