Tamoxifen and fluoxymesterone in advanced breast cancer: a controlled clinical trial

Seventy-nine postmenopausal women with stage IV breast cancer and no previous endocrine therapy or chemotherapy received tamoxifen or fluoxymesterone in an open, randomized, cross-over trial. The overall remission rate was 30% with tamoxifen as the first course of treatment and 19% with fluoxymesterone as the first course of treatment. Bone metastases were seen in 21 patients receiving tamoxifen and in 20 patients receiving fluoxymesterone. There were six and five remissions in these two groups respectively. The time to the first change in therapy was significantly longer for the tamoxifen group (P = 0.003). The survival of the patients who received tamoxifen as the first course of endocrine treatment was better (P = 0.05).