Elderly breast cancer patients treated with Nab-paclitaxel: Results in real clinical practice

Abstract Objective Clinical trials have shown that Nab-paclitaxel is more effective than paclitaxel in the treatment of metastatic breast cancer (MBC). Although the incidence of cancer increases with age, elderly patients are under-represented in clinical trials and tend to receive suboptimal treatment to avoid toxicity. The main aim of our study was to compare progression-free survival (PFS) among patients older and younger than 65 years treated with Nab-paclitaxel in real-world clinical practice. A secondary aim was to assess overall survival (OS) as well as the response rate and toxicity. Methods and patients This single-centre study retrospectively analyzed a cohort of 60 patients with MBC treated with Nab-paclitaxel monotherapy in Hospital Clinico Lozano Blesa de Zaragoza. Results The median PFS was 5.92 months (3.62–11.2) in patients  Conclusions Although patients in the cohort studied had a median age of 60.45 years, which is higher than the median age in most clinical trials, PFS and OS in conditions of real-world clinical practice were similar to previously published data. The results of the use of Nab-paclitaxel in patients older than 65 years are similar to those in younger patients, with no additional toxicity problems. The results of our study agree with those of other notable studies.