BACKGROUND

Studies reported survival benefits from early initiation of adjuvant chemotherapy from the time of mastectomy among breast cancer patients.

OBJECTIVES

The researchers aimed to determine if early initiation of adjuvant chemotherapy among early-stage breast cancer patients undergoing modified radical mastectomy at Bataan General Hospital and Medical Center has increased the patient’s survival. We also want to asses if the Bataan General Hospital and Medical Center department of Oncology is rendering adjuvant chemotherapy as compared to the international standards. We also want to know the factors affecting the timing of initiation of adjuvant chemotherapy among the subjects.

METHODS

A retrospective cohort study involving chart review covering the year May 2015 to January 2020 for stage 1 to 3 breast cancer patients, with a histopathologic confirmation, underwent definitive/curative breast surgery, and had started on adjuvant cytotoxic chemotherapy are included in the study.

RESULTS AND CONCLUSION

In this retrospective study, we observed that time to initiation of adjuvant chemotherapy among breast cancer patients at Bataan General Hospital and Medical Center does not significantly improve overall survival of patients. The BGHMC Department of Oncology service is trailing the cut off 12 weeks or 84 days of initiation of adjuvant chemotherapy from the date of mastectomy. We also used the factors that affects the timing of initiation of adjuvant chemotherapy and found out that these variables cannot predict whether it will increase the patient’s survival since our sample size is too small.

Chemotherapy, Adjuvant ; Mastectomy, Modified Radical