Older Women Shortchanged on Breast Cancer Treatment

Ivanhoe Newswire

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(Ivanhoe Newswire) -- Older women may not be receiving all the care they need for their breast cancer.

According to researchers who looked at data on a group of 354 women ages 70 and older who were treated for breast cancer at one community hospital between 1992 and 2002, older women are less likely to receive recommended chemotherapy, radiation, and hormonal therapy necessary to effectively treat the disease. The older a woman is, the less likely she will end up with these definitive treatments.

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The results also revealed doctors were lax about providing a thorough diagnosis of the disease. While more than 70 percent of the patients were diagnosed with stage I or II cancer, evaluation of the lymph nodes to assess for cancer spread was skipped in 36 percent of the cases. That figure rose to 56 percent among the women in the study who were ages 80 and older. Doctors can't really determine the stage of cancer without assessing the lymph nodes to see if the cancer has spread.

Mammography was underused as a screening method to detect early breast cancer as well.

The researchers note many things could be interfering with breast cancer diagnosis and treatment in older women, such as other serious medical conditions. But they believe relatively healthy older women deserve to receive the same state-of-the-art breast cancer care offered to younger women.

"Contrary to many physicians' beliefs, the data suggest that fit older patients derive the same benefits from treatment as do their younger counterparts," conclude the authors. "The cornerstone of treatment of older breast cancer patients is an adequate geriatric assessment that helps estimate life expectancy and predict tolerance of treatment. Treatment strategies then ought to be individualized based on this assessment."

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SOURCE: Archives of Surgery, 2006;141:985-990