Prognostic factors related to breast cancer survival

Objective. To evaluate prognostic factors for breast cancer in Mexican women. Material and Methods. Four hundred and thirty two women with breast cancer, admitted from 1990 to 1999 to the General Hospital of Mexico, were included to evaluate their survival using the Kaplan-Meier technique and Cox proportional hazard method. Results. Overall 5-year survival was 58.9%. The shortest survival rate corresponds to the clinical stage (IIIB, 47.5%; IIIA,44.2%; and IV, 15%), the haematological metastasis (21.4%) and surgical edges with positive tumor (12.5%). Lymph node-positive (RR, 1.9; IC95%, 1.3-2.8), clinical stage IV (RR, 14.8; IC95%, 5.5-39.7) and surgical edges with positive tumor (RR, 2.4; IC95%, 1.2-4.8) were the central prognostic factors. Conclusions. These results give consistency to diagnostic and therapeutic criteria for women with breast cancer who receive medical attention in Mexico, taking into consideration the characteristics of the tumor -such as extension, clinical stage and status of the lymph nodes- before making a decision as to the initial therapy.