[Clinical prognostic factors in breast cancer]

Five year survival of 683 mammary carcinomas would confirm the prognostic value of T.N.M. classification (UICC), of tumor particular characteristics (size, fixation to neighbouring structures) and presence or absence of clinical nodes. A clinical-histological relationship was studied for axillary nodes: in our experience, clinical determination is more reliable for estimation of N0 and N2 than N1. Three groups of age were considered; the age, T and N corrected five year survival show a higher mortality for patients older than 60 years with T3-T4, N greater than 0 carcinomas. The study of this prospective computerised register confirms the prognostic value of developping growth tumors (PEV) described by P. Denoix. In fact, inflammatory carcinomas (PEV 2-PEV 3) show a poor 5 year survival and PEV 1 is an intermediate pronostic group between stable and inflammatory carcinomas. PEV 1 was showed to be an independant clinical factor from T and N characteristics.