Who Needs a Taxane? Tailoring Breast Cancer Therapy

Tailoring adjuvant therapy for early-stage breast cancer patients is an important goal for medical oncologists for two reasons: A substantial fraction of patients might not require adjuvant therapy to lower their risk for recurrence, and identifying optimal therapies for those who do require adjuvant therapy could improve clinical outcomes. Investigators have focused on molecular markers and gene expression in tumor tissues to identify patients whose prognoses and, potentially, outcomes from particular systemic therapies might differ. Examples include patients whose breast cancers express estrogen receptors (ERs), who likely would benefit from endocrine therapies, and patients with HER2-overexpressing tumors, who would benefit from adjuvant…