Underserved African-American and white women with breast cancer have similar prognostic profiles for estrogen receptor and tumor grade

3696 Background: Survival disparity for African-American (AA) women with breast cancer has been associated with more frequent biological characteristics of poor-prognosis, including high tumor grade of differentiation (grade) and estrogen receptor (ER) negative status. However, AA women are more commonly underserved and have low socioeconomic status (SES), and other studies suggest that low SES, not simply race, is associated with this prognostic profile. We hypothesized that low SES AA and non-Hispanic white (white) women with breast cancer, who received standardized care at a single public institution, would demonstrate similar poor prognostic profiles regarding tumor grade and ER status. Methods: Clinical-pathological features were examined in 341 AA and 94 white, consecutive low SES women, diagnosed and treated for breast cancer between 2000-05, at the MBCCOP, Stroger Hospital of Cook County, in Chicago. Univariate and multivariate logistic regression analyses were used to predict associations with ER status and tumor grade, and to evaluate differences between races. Survival was estimated using the Kaplan-Meier method. Results: Univariate analysis predicted that ER negative status was associated with younger age, tumor size > 2cm, node positive status, AJCC stage ≥ 2B, and grade 3 tumors, in AA women. In white women however, ER negative status was only associated with grade 3 tumors. Multivariate analysis demonstrated that high tumor grade was the only significant predictive factor for ER negative status in both races (p