Abstract C026: Lack of HER4 signaling predicts poor prognosis among triple-negative breast cancer patients of African descent: A multi-institutional study

Triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) disproportionately affects African-American (AA) women. Literature underscores that women from West Africa exhibit higher TNBC incidence and mortality rates than AA women. Distinctions in inherent tumor biology between the races have been speculated to underlie this global disparate burden. We conducted a multi-institutional study in which we analyzed differences in expression of BC-related immunohistochemical biomarkers between self-reported European, EA, AA, and African TNBC patients treated at Nottingham University in Nottingham, UK, Emory University in Atlanta, GA, and Olabisi Onabanjo University Teaching Hospital in Sagamu, Nigeria, respectively. We discovered highly significant differences in expression of the members of the HER family, HER1/EGFR, HER3 and HER4, between the racial groups (p