Introduction:

There are few guidelines for the treatment of breast cancer (BC) in older patients, which can lead to under- or over-treatment.

Objective:

To understand the characteristics, management and evolution of early BC in older women.

Material and methods:

Observational, descriptive, cross-sectional study. Data were collected on the clinical-pathological characteristics and evolution of patients aged 70 years or older, treated for BC in the period from 1/1/ 2011 to 31/12/ 2018, at the Hospital de Clínicas. Descriptive statistical tools were used and the Kaplan-Meier method was applied to calculate the overall survival (OS) rate.

Results:

31 patients were included; median age at diagnosis was 76.8 years old; the clinical-pathological characteristics were: ductal carcinoma: 71%; HG 1-2: 74.2%; stage I: 54.8%; no axillary metastases: 80.6%; HER2-ER/PR+ 80.6%; HER2+ 16.7%, and triple negative 3.2%. Of all the patients, 29% were diagnosed through screening and 74.2% were treated according to current guidelines, while 38.7% were under-treated and 16.1% over-treated. The median OS was 98.7 months.

Conclusions:

A minority of patients were diagnosed by screening, the most frequent histological type was ductal and the prevalence of HER2-RE/RP+ tumors was higher than in younger patients. Most patients received standard treatment.

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