The role of postoperative radiotherapy in node negative breast cancer patients with pT3–T4 disease

Abstract Aims To evaluate the role of postmastectomy radiotherapy (PMRT) in patients with pT3–T4N0M0 breast cancer. Methods 156 patients with T3–T4N0M0 breast cancer were retrospectively analyzed. Results Locoregional recurrences were seen in 17 of 156 patients with a median time for development of 27 months (5.7–248.7 months). Two of 9 patients who were not treated with post-operative radiation therapy had locoregional recurrence as compared with 16 of 147 patients receiving radiotherapy. In multivariate analysis, presence of locoregional recurrence was the only significant prognostic factor for overall survival (18% vs. 86%, p < 0.001, RR = 9.05). The patients with a median number of dissected lymph nodes ≥10 had a significantly better locoregional disease free survival rate as compared with patients with dissected lymph nodes