The pathologic characteristics of breast cancer in China and its shift during 1999-2008: A national-wide multicenter cross-sectional image over 10 years

Shan Zheng, Jing Qiao Bai, Jing Li, Jin Hu Fan, Yi Pang, Qing Kun Song, Rong Huang, Hong Jian Yang, Feng Xu, Ning Lu*, You Lin Qiao

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

75 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

In China, breast cancer is currently the most common malignancy and the sixth leading cause of cancer death in women. But, the characteristics of breast cancer in the whole population are not determined. The aim of this study was to perform a detailed study on pathologic characteristics of breast cancer representing the whole population in China during 1999-2008 and to compare the difference in invasive breast cancer between the Western and Chinese. We randomly collected 4,211 inpatient at seven hospitals in representative geographical regions of China during 1999-2008. All the hospitals had the ability of comprehensive cancer treatment. The pathologic characters including estrogen receptor (ER), progesterone receptor (PR), and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) status were surveyed. The shift of pathologic characters was evaluated and the data from China were also compared with those of the Western, both using Chi-square test. We found as follow. (i) The median age of the patients was 48 years and showed the similar characters of Asia. (ii) Breast cancer in China showed more invasive ductal carcinoma with larger tumor size, later stage, lower ER and PR expression and higher HER2 overexpression than those in the Western (p < 0.001). (iii) Both tumor size and stage at diagnosis decreased year by year (p < 0.001). Breast cancer in China showed more aggressive behavior than those in western countries, although tumor size and stage at diagnosis decreased by year during 1999-2008. We addressed the urgent needs for employ race-specific breast cancer screen, diagnosis methods, and therapeutic models in China.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)2622-2631
Number of pages10
JournalInternational Journal of Cancer
Volume131
Issue number11
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Dec 2012
Externally publishedYes

Keywords

  • breast carcinoma
  • ethnic populations
  • pathologic characteristics

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