Abstract
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND:
Adjuvant hormonal treatment with aromatase inhibitors for postmenopausal women with early-stage breast cancer is associated with relatively few side effects but it may cause bone mass loss which can be detected with a dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry scan.
AIM:
In this study, we evaluate the skeletal effects of aromatase inhibitors in postmenopausal women with early-stage breast cancer.
PATIENTS AND METHODS:
This is an observational retrospective case-control study enrolled 70 postmenopausal women with early-stage breast cancer on adjuvant aromatase inhibitors and 70 postmenopausal control women, the two groups were compared regarding the prevalence and severity of bone mass loss by using the DXA scan of their lumbar spine.
RESULTS:
Bone mineral density was significantly lower in breast cancer cases (mean T score was (-2.50 ± 1.01) compared to the control group (mean T score was (-2.12 ± 0.79) with significant (p-value =0.014), also 60%of breast cancer cases were osteoporotic compared to 32% in the control group (p-value =0.005). Based on univariate analysis, breast cancer was associated with 2.79 folds increased probability of osteoporosis
CONCLUSION:
A significant proportion of our breast cancer patients who used aromatase inhibitors were osteoporotic.
Keywords
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