Male breast cancer: clinical-epidemiological characteristics of 1189 Brazilian patients

Abstract

Purpose: To describe the clinical-epidemiological features of male patients with breast cancer in Brazil. Methods: Data from male patients with breast cancer treated from 2000 through 2009 were obtained from the Brazilian Hospital Cancer Register databases. Descriptive statistics were performed. Results: A total of 1189 male patients were included. The mean age at diagnosis was 59.6 years (± 13.6). Tumours were categorised as clinical stage I (14.3%), stage II (38.3%), stage III (34.1%) and stage IV (13.3%). The most frequent histological type was invasive ductal carcinoma (83.7%). The first course treatment (alone or combined) consisted of chemotherapy in 53.2%, surgery in 49.2, radiation therapy in 36.8 and hormonal therapy in 21.0%; 3.4% of cases did not receive treatment. Treatment modality varies according to the tumor-node-metastasis (TNM) stage. The inadequate response rate was 15.9%, and 7.4% of patients died after the first course of treatment. Adequate response according to the first-course cancer treatment, after adjusted for clinical stage, was associated with being Caucasian (odds ratio (OR) = 2.50; 95% confidence interval (95% CI): 1.35–4.65) and submitted to chemotherapy (OR = 0.46; 95% CI: 0.28–0.74). Conclusions: Male breast cancer diagnosis is often made in the advanced stage. Consequently, patients were subjected to more aggressive treatments, with poorer clinical response.