Review of: Comparison of gene expression profiles predicting progression in breast cancer patients treated with tamoxifen

Abstract

Background: Molecular signatures that predict outcome in tamoxifen-treated breast cancer patients have been identified. For the first time, we compared these response profiles in an independent cohort of (neo)adjuvant systemic treatment naïve breast cancer patients treated with first-line tamoxifen for metastatic disease. Methods: Froma consecutive series of 246 estrogen receptor (ER) positive primary tumors, gene expression profiling was performed on available frozen tumors using 44K oligoarrays (n = 69). A 78-gene tamoxifen response profile (formerly consisting of 81 cDNA clones), a 21-gene set (microarray-based Recurrence Score), as well as the HOXB13-IL17BR ratio (Two-Gene Index, RT-PCR)..