Anthracyclines in Adjuvant Br... Video Transcript

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The trick in the adjuvant setting is that you can get more of the epirubicin in over a shorter period of time and a total larger dose without doing the cardiac damage that you would see with a similar dose of adriamycin.

CATHY CONLEY: We hear the term "5-year survival rate." What does this mean?

KATHLEEN PRITCHARD, MD: In many cancers, a patient who does not have a recurrence after five years is considered cured. In breast cancer, that's probably not the case, but we do look at outcomes at 5 years, 10 years and 15 years as a mark of how a patient is progressing through their life after they have a diagnosis of breast cancer.

CATHY CONLEY: Dr. Muss, we hear a lot about dose-limiting toxicity or cumulative toxicity. What does this mean?

HYMAN B. MUSS, MD: In general oncology in adjuvant therapy, we believe achieving a certain threshold dose of treatment is important. In other words, if a woman goes below a certain dose, we believe that therapy is definitely not going to be as effective. So a dose-limiting toxicity would be a side effect that prevents you from giving a certain dose of medication. Now, if that dose was lower than the threshold, then it would be very important, because you might not be giving the patient adequate treatment, and you would have to consider something else.

Cumulative dose means taking a drug like an anthracycline and measuring actually the amount of drug that's given, like we take pills in milligrams. So we count all the milligrams up that you've gotten in your treatment, and we divide it by your body surface area, which we get by your height and weight, and those data allow us to get a certain dose level where we know if we exceed it we're likely to cause heart damage.

CATHY CONLEY: And finally, Dr. Pritchard, what advice do you have for our viewers?

KATHLEEN PRITCHARD, MD: I'd advise them to read all they can and learn all they can on the internet, in books, in magazines, and to talk to their physicians about what they read, and understand whether it applies to them.

CATHY CONLEY: Dr. Pritchard, thanks so much for joining us.

KATHLEEN PRITCHARD, MD: Thank you very much.

CATHY CONLEY: Dr. Hyman Muss, thank you for joining us.

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