The response to endocrine therapy in patients with advanced breast cancer in Great Britain and Japan

A prospective study has been carried out to compare the response rates to endocrine therapy of Japanese and British women with breast cancer. Premenopausal women were treated by ovarian ablation, patients who were up to five years postmenopausal were prescribed androgen therapy and patients who were more than five years postmenopausal were treated with oestrogens. No differences in response rate, response time or survival could be detected in the three categories of patients. Significantly more Japanese patients presented with pulmonary metastases in the pre- and postmenopausal groups. In postmenopausal Japanese patients treated with oestrogens, those with pulmonary metastases survived significantly longer.