Abstract
The proportion of bilateral primary breast cancer among all breast cancer patients has been increasing because new diagnostic imaging and treatments for breast cancer have been developed. We analyzed the clinicopathological features of bilateral primary breast cancer patients in our hospital. There were 1,250 primary breast cancer patients who underwent surgery at our hospital between 1997 to 2009. Of these patients, 32 patients had bilateral primary breast cancer ; and of those, 21 patients had synchronous bilateral primary breast cancer and 11 patients had metacchronous. The average age at diagnosis of breast cancer was 47.5 years for first metachronous cancer, which is significantly younger than that of synchronous cancer which was, 61 years (P=0.004).
Although second metachronous primary cancer involved human epidermal growth factor receptor type 2 (HER-2) positive lesion in 45% of them, metachronous breast cancer had a better prognosis than that of synchronous cancer. Both early detection by diagnostic imaging and adjuvant therapy with Trastuzumab for HER-2 positive breast cancer might be expected to improve the prognosis of metachronous primary breast cancer.
