Changing estrogen and progesterone receptor patterns in breast carcinoma during the menstrual cycle and menopause

✍ Scribed by Pascal Pujol; Jean-Pierre Daures; Simon Thezenas; Fançoise Guilleux; Phillipe Rouanet; Jean Grenier

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1998
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 169 KB
• Volume: 83
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0008-543X
• DOI: 10.1002/(sici)1097-0142(19980815)83:4<698::aid-cncr10>3.0.co;2-n

✦ Synopsis

BACKGROUND.

Estrogen receptor (ER) and progesterone receptor (PgR) status at the time of breast carcinoma surgery is used as a marker of both prognosis and hormone dependency to guide adjuvant therapy. The authors studied the influence of hormonal milieu at the time of surgery on ER and PgR levels.

METHODS.

A population of 2020 patients with breast carcinoma, including 575 premenopausal women, was analyzed. ER and PgR levels were determined by radioligand binding assays (cutoff values, 10 fmol/mg). Serum estradiol (E2), progesterone (Pg), follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH), and luteinizing hormone (LH) levels obtained on the day of surgery were used to define the menstrual cycle phase in premenopause.

RESULTS.

In premenopause, there was a higher proportion of ER positive (ER ϩ ) tumors in the follicular phase (62%, n ϭ 316) than in the ovulatory phase (51%, n ϭ 59) and the luteal phase (53%, n ϭ 200, P ϭ 0.03). The mean ER level was also higher in the follicular phase (30 fmol/mg) than in the ovulatory phase (20 fmol/ mg) and the luteal phase (25 fmol/mg, P Ͻ 0.001). The percentage of PgR positive (PgR ϩ ) tumors tended to be higher in the ovulatory phase (85%) than in the follicular (78%) and luteal (72%) phases (P ϭ 0.11). The mean PgR was also higher in the ovulatory phase (177 fmol/mg) than in the follicular and luteal phases (134 and 92 fmol/mg, respectively; P Ͻ 0.001). The percentage of ER ϩ tumors was higher among menopausal women than among premenopausal women (67% vs. 59%, respectively; P Ͻ 0.001). Conversely, the percentage of PgR ϩ tumors was lower among menopausal women than among premenopausal women (65% vs. 78%, respectively; P Ͻ 0.001). In premenopause, there was a weak negative correlation between ER and E2 levels. No correlations were found between levels of ER and Pg