Background: Eribulin's clinical benefit remains unclear; so, studies analyzing its effectiveness in routine clinical practice are interesting.
Patients and methods: This is a multicenter, retrospective study including patients with human epidermal growth factor receptor-2-negative metastatic breast cancer which assesses effectiveness and safety of eribulin.
Results: A total of 140 women were included, with a median age of 57 years. The median overall survival and progression-free survival were 8.8 (95% confidence interval: 6.1-11.4) and 2.8 months (95% confidence interval: 2.5-3.1), respectively. For patients with hormonal receptor expression, a significantly longer progression-free survival was observed: 3.4 (95%confidence interval: 2.3-4.5) versus triple negative: 2.0 (95%confidence interval: 1.7-2.3) months, p = 0.003. Also, those who had received capecitabine prior to eribulin had a higher median overall survival than those who had not received it (9.5 months, 95% confidence interval: 6.6-12.5 vs. 4.8 months, 95% confidence interval: 3.4-6.2; p = 0.001). When only triple-negative patients were included, median overall survival was 6.5 (95% confidence interval: 0.1-16.2) for those who had received previous capecitabine versus 4.3 (95% confidence interval: 2.8-5.8) months for patients who had not received it; p =0.006. The safety profile of eribulin was adequate.
Conclusion: Effectiveness of eribulin in a real-life human epidermal growth factor receptor-2--negative population is lower than that observed in clinical trials. Its benefit seems to be higher in patients with hormonal receptor expression and patients who had received capecitabine prior to eribulin. The safety profile of eribulin is adequate.
Keywords: Eribulin; capecitabine; human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 negative; metastatic breast cancer.