Survival outcomes of neoadjuvant versus adjuvant chemotherapy in triple-negative breast cancer: a meta-analysis of 36,480 cases.

BACKGROUND: The survival outcomes of neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NACT) versus adjuvant chemotherapy (ACT) for patients with triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) remain unclear. Therefore, in this study, a meta-analysis was conducted to analyze current evidence on the survival outcomes of NACT versus ACT in TNBC. METHODS: A systematic search was performed on the PubMed and Embase databases to identify relevant articles investigating the survival outcomes of NACT versus ACT in TNBC. RESULTS: A total of nine studies involving 36,480 patients met the selection criteria. Among them, 10,728 (29.41%) received NACT, and 25,752 (70.59%) received ACT. The pathological complete response (pCR) rate was 35% (95% CI = 0.23-0.48). Compared with ACT, the overall survival (OS) of NACT was poor (HR = 1.59; 95% CI = 1.25-2.02; P = 0.0001), and there was no significant difference in disease-free survival (DFS) between the two treatments (HR = 0.85; 95% CI = 0.54-1.34; P = 0.49). NACT with pCR significantly improved the OS (HR = 0.53; 95% CI = 0.29-0.98; P = 0.04) and DFS (HR = 0.52; 95% CI = 0.29-0.94; P = 0.03), while the OS (HR = 1.18; 95% CI = 1.09-1.28; P < 0.0001) and DFS (HR = 2.36; 95% CI = 1.42-3.89; P = 0.0008) of patients with residual disease (RD) following NACT were worse compared to those receiving ACT. CONCLUSION: These findings suggest that, for TNBC, NACT with pCR is superior to ACT in improving OS and DFS, and it turns to be opposite when patients are receiving NACT with RD.

Automated segmentation and diagnosis of pneumothorax on chest X-rays with fully convolutional multi-scale ScSE-DenseNet: a retrospective study.

BACKGROUND: Pneumothorax (PTX) may cause a life-threatening medical emergency with cardio-respiratory collapse that requires immediate intervention and rapid treatment. The screening and diagnosis of pneumothorax usually rely on chest radiographs. However, the pneumothoraces in chest X-rays may be very subtle with highly variable in shape and overlapped with the ribs or clavicles, which are often difficult to identify. Our objective was to create a large chest X-ray dataset for pneumothorax with pixel-level annotation and to train an automatic segmentation and diagnosis framework to assist radiologists to identify pneumothorax accurately and timely. METHODS: In this study, an end-to-end deep learning framework is proposed for the segmentation and diagnosis of pneumothorax on chest X-rays, which incorporates a fully convolutional DenseNet (FC-DenseNet) with multi-scale module and spatial and channel squeezes and excitation (scSE) modules. To further improve the precision of boundary segmentation, we propose a spatial weighted cross-entropy loss function to penalize the target, background and contour pixels with different weights. RESULTS: This retrospective study are conducted on a total of eligible 11,051 front-view chest X-ray images (5566 cases of PTX and 5485 cases of Non-PTX). The experimental results show that the proposed algorithm outperforms the five state-of-the-art segmentation algorithms in terms of mean pixel-wise accuracy (MPA) with [Formula: see text] and dice similarity coefficient (DSC) with [Formula: see text], and achieves competitive performance on diagnostic accuracy with 93.45% and [Formula: see text]-score with 92.97%. CONCLUSION: This framework provides substantial improvements for the automatic segmentation and diagnosis of pneumothorax and is expected to become a clinical application tool to help radiologists to identify pneumothorax on chest X-rays.

Responses of a polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon-degrading bacterium, Paraburkholderia fungorum JT-M8, to Cd (II) under P-limited oligotrophic conditions.

For the bioremediation of mixed-contamination sites, studies on polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) degradation or Cd (II) tolerance in bacteria are commonly implemented in nutrient-rich media. In contrast, in the field, inocula usually encounter harsh oligotrophic habitats. In this study, the environmental strain Paraburkholderia fungorum JT-M8 was used to explore the overlooked Cd (II) defense mechanism during PAH dissipation under P-limited oligotrophic condition. The results showed that the growth and PAH degradation ability of JT-M8 under Cd (II) stress were correlated with phosphate contents and exhibited self-regulating properties. Phosphates mainly affected the Cd (II) content in solution, while the cellular distribution of Cd (II) depended on Cd (II) levels; Cd (II) was mainly located in the cytoplasm when exposed to less Cd (II), and vice versa. The unique Cd (II) detoxification pathways could be classified into three aspects: (i) Cd (II) ionic equilibrium and dose-response effects regulated by environmental matrices (phosphate contents); (ii) bacterial physiological self-regulation, e.g., cell surface-binding, protein secretion and active transport systems; and (iii) specific adaptive responses (flagellum aggregation). This study emphasizes the importance of considering culture conditions when assessing the metal tolerance and provides new insight into the bacterial detoxification process of complex PAH-Cd (II) pollutants.

Shanghai Community-Based Schizophrenia Cohort (SCS): a protocol for establishing a longitudinal cohort and research database of patients with schizophrenia receiving community-based mental health treatment.

INTRODUCTION: Drivers for remission, relapse and violence-related behaviour among patients with schizophrenia are the most complicated issue. METHODS AND ANALYSIS: This study aims to recruit a longitudinal cohort of patients with schizophrenia. Two suburban districts and two urban districts were randomly selected according to health service facilities, population, geographical region and socioeconomic status. Individuals (>18 years old) who received a diagnosis of schizophrenia following the International Classification of Diseases (10th edition) criteria within the past 3 years will be invited as participants. Assessments will be carried out in local community health centres. Data will be used to (1) establish a community-based schizophrenia cohort and biobank, (2) prospectively determine the course of multidimensional functional outcomes of patients with schizophrenia who are receiving community-based mental health treatment, and (3) map the trajectories of patients with schizophrenia and prospectively determine the course of multidimensional outcomes based on the differential impact of potentially modifiable moderators. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: The study has been reviewed and approved by the Human Research Ethics Committee of Shanghai Mental Health Center (2021-67). Results of the study will be disseminated through peer-reviewed journals. If effective, related educational materials will be released to the public.

Effect of postmastectomy radiotherapy on T1-2N1M0 triple-negative breast cancer.

BACKGROUND: The effect of postmastectomy radiotherapy (PMRT) on T1-2N1M0 triple-negative breast cancers (TNBC) remains unclear. The population-based study aimed to investigate the survival outcomes of T1-2N1M0 TNBC patients who underwent PMRT or not. METHODS: We selected 1743 patients with T1-2N1M0 TNBC who underwent mastectomy between 2010 and 2015 through the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) database. After propensity score matching (PSM), the PMRT and no-PMRT groups consisted of 586 matched patients, respectively. The Kaplan-Meier method was applied to calculate breast cancer-specific survival (BCSS) and cox proportional hazard model was used to determine the prognostic factors of T1-2N1M0 TNBC. RESULTS: The 5-year BCSS for the PMRT and no-PMRT groups was 79.1% and 74.7%, respectively. Analysis showed that in patients with three nodes positive, radiotherapy could significantly improve BCSS (HR = 0.396, 95% CI = 0.175-0.900, P = 0.027), but it brought no significant advantage in BCSS in patients with one or two nodes positive (HR = 1.061, 95% CI = 0.725-1.552, P = 0.761; HR = 0.657, 95% CI = 0.405-1.065, P = 0.088). In addition, PMRT improves the BCSS in TNBC patients with T2 tumor concomitant with three positive lymph nodes (HR = 0.343, 95% CI = 0.132-0.890, P = 0.028). CONCLUSION: TNBC patients with T2 tumor concomitant with three positive lymph nodes can benefit from PMRT.

Survival outcomes after breast-conserving surgery plus radiotherapy compared with mastectomy in breast ductal carcinoma in situ with microinvasion.

Ductal carcinoma in situ with microinvasion (DCIS-MI) is a subtype of breast cancer with a good prognosis, for which both breast conserving surgery plus radiotherapy (BCS + RT) and mastectomy are feasible surgical methods, but no clear conclusion has been made on the choice of these treatments. We used the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results database to extract 5432 DCIS-MI patients. Participants were divided into the BCS + RT group and the mastectomy group. We compared the overall survival (OS) and breast cancer-specific survival (BCSS) of the two groups using the Kaplan-Meier method and Cox regressions before and after propensity score matching (PSM). Before PSM, both univariate and multivariate analyses showed that BCS + RT group had significantly higher OS and BCSS compared with patients in the mastectomy group (P < 0.001). After PSM, the multivariate analysis showed that compared with mastectomy, the BCS + RT showed significantly higher OS and BCSS (HR = 0.676, 95% CI = 0.540-0.847, P < 0.001; HR = 0.565,95% CI = 0.354-0.903, P = 0.017). In addition, the subgroup analysis showed that BCS + RT is at least equivalent to mastectomy with respect to OS and BCSS in any subgroup. For patients with DCIS-MI, the prognosis of BCS + RT was superior to mastectomy.

Comparative Analysis of the Wounded in Patients and Deaths in a Hospital Following the Three Major Earthquakes in Western China.

The purpose of this study was to analyze the injury characteristics of patients and therapeutic strategies for patients injured in the last three big earthquakes in China, so as to provide a reference for the improvement of emergency plans for earthquakes. The analysis was based on the data provided by the Mianyang Central Hospital (MCH) from May 12th, 2008 to September 26th, 2017. Microsoft EXCEL software was used for data input, and SPSS was used for statistical analysis. A total of 1,390 earthquake-related patients were hospitalized in MCH. Most patients were admitted to the hospital within the first 2 weeks after the earthquake. The main causes for seismic injuries involved hit/strike by objects or building collapse /burying. Extremity fractures accounted for most injuries, especially 3 days after an earthquake. But soft tissue injuries cannot be neglected. Most earthquake patients were mainly treated by means of surgery and the majority were related to orthopedics. We found that different areas, population, and religions needed a tailored approach to the rescue effort. Therefore, the earthquake magnitude scale has a significant influence on mechanisms, types and severity of the injury of patients injured in earthquakes, as well as their timely transfer, management, and prognosis. Traumatic injuries are very common and thereby various surgical procedures especially orthopedic and neurosurgery are the domain of treatment modalities. Disaster preparedness and combined surgical team effort need to be focused on to reduce both mortality and morbidity.

Prognostic Factors and Models for Elderly (≥70 Years Old) Primary Operable Triple-Negative Breast Cancer: Analysis From the National Cancer Database.

Background: Triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) is an aggressive subtype of breast cancer. In the elderly (≥70 years old) primary operable (T1-3N0-1M0) TNBC, individualized treatment modalities for this population are pivotal and important, but limited studies are explored. Methods: The clinicopathological features of elderly primary operable TNBC patients were retrospectively selected from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database between January 2010 and December 2015. Kaplan-Meier curves were used to show the survival patterns in the different subgroups. Multivariate Cox analysis was used to identify independent risk factors in the 3-, 5-, and 7- year overall survival (OS) and cancer-specific survival (CSS) in this subpopulation. The predictive model was further developed and validated for clinical use. Result: Between 2010 and 2015 years, a total of 4,761 elderly primary operable TNBC patients were enrolled for the study, with a mean age of 76 years and a median follow-up of 56 months. The multivariate Cox analysis showed that age (increased per year: hazard ratio (HR) = 1.05), race (Asian/Pacific Islander and American Indian/Alaska Native, HR = 0.73), differentiation grade (grade II: HR = 2.01; grade III/IV: HR = 2.67), larger tumor size (T1c: HR = 1.83; T2: HR = 2.78; T3: HR = 4.93), positive N stage (N1mi: HR = 1.60; N1: HR = 1.54), receiving radiation therapy (HR = 0.66), and receiving adjuvant chemotherapy (HR = 0.61) were the independent prognostic factors for OS, and a similar prognostic pattern was also determined in CSS. Besides, two nomograms for predicting the 3-, 5-, and 7-year OS and CSS in this population were developed with a favorable concordance index of 0.716 and 0.746, respectively. Conclusion: The results highlight that both radiation and adjuvant chemotherapy are significantly associated with favorable long-term OS and CSS probability in elderly primary operable TNBC patients. Based on the determined independent prognostic factors, the novel nomograms could assist the oncologists to make individualized clinical decisions for the subpopulation at different risks.

The different outcomes between breast-conserving surgery plus radiotherapy and mastectomy in metaplastic breast cancer: A population-based study.

BACKGROUND: Metaplastic breast cancer (MBC) are rare. The survival outcomes of MBC patients after breast conserving surgery plus radiotherapy (BCS+RT) or mastectomy have not been established. The study aimed to compare survival outcomes of MBC patients subjected to BCS+RT or mastectomy therapeutic options. METHODS: Patients who were subjected to BCS+RT or mastectomy between 2004 and 2014 were enrolled in this study through the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) database. Breast cancer-specific survival (BCSS) and the overall survival (OS) of the participants were determined. Cox proportional hazard model and the Kaplan Meier method were used to determine the correlation between the two surgical methods and survival outcomes. RESULTS: A total of 1197 patients were enrolled in this study. Among them, 439 patients were subjected to BCS+RT, while 758 patients were subjected to mastectomy. After propensity score matching (PSM), the BCS+RT and mastectomy groups consisted of 321 patients, respectively. The univariate and multivariate analysis with a 6-month landmark all indicate that patients receiving BCS+RT has higher OS than patients receiving mastectomy (HR = 0.701,95% CI = 0.496-0.990, P = 0.044; HR = 0.684,95% CI = 0.479-0.977, P = 0.037) while the BCSS was no difference between the two groups (HR = 0.739,95% CI = 0.474-1.153, P = 0.183; HR = 0.741,95% CI = 0.468-1.173, P = 0.200). CONCLUSION: The BCS+RT therapeutic option exhibits a higher OS in MBC patients compared to the mastectomy approach.

Efficacy and Safety of Radiofrequency Ablation for Breast Cancer Smaller Than 2 cm: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.

BACKGROUND: To evaluate the efficacy and safety of radiofrequency ablation (RFA) of breast cancer smaller than 2 cm. METHODS: A systematic search was conducted in the PubMed and EMBASE databases to identify published studies investigating the efficacy and safety of RFA for breast cancer smaller than 2 cm. The main outcomes were technical success rate of the ablation, complete ablation rate, complications and local recurrence. Secondary considerations were mode of anesthesia, pain tolerance, mean ablation time and surgical excision after ablation. RESULTS: Seventeen studies involving 399 patients and 401 lesions met the inclusion criteria. Nearly 99%(95%CI=0.98-1.00) of lesions achieved good technical success rate.Notably, 83.88% of the patients received RFA under general anesthesia (333/397) whereas 15.87% received RFA under local anesthesia (63/397). Of the 63, 98.41% tolerated the pain associated with the procedure. Majority of patients (65.74%, 261/397) underwent surgical excision of the tumor after ablation whereas in a few patients (34.26%, 136/397), the tumor tissue was retained in the breast after ablation. Complete ablation was achieved in 96% of patients for a mean time of 15.8 minutes (95%CI=0.93-0.99). Overall, only 2% (95%CI=0.01-0.04) of the individuals developed complications. Skin burns (2.02%, 8/397) were the most common complications. There was no local recurrence after a median follow-up of 27.29 months, whether or not they underwent surgical resection following RFA. CONCLUSION: The results show that RFA for breast cancer smaller than 2 cm is safe and effective. However, prospective studies are needed to validate this conclusion.

Lower Health Literacy of Mania Than Depression Among Older People: A Random Survey of a Community Healthcare Service Center.

Purpose: This study examines health literacy among older outpatients in two Community Healthcare Service Centers in Shanghai, China to facilitate the design of public education programs for the aged population on mood disorders (both depression and mania). Patients and Methods: A total of 173 outpatients aged 60 years or more with a chronic physical illness were randomly sampled. A health literacy questionnaire was used to assess participants' awareness of depression and mania. Participants were then asked to label two vignettes depicting depression and mania and to give their recommendations for how to seek help for those in the vignettes and how mood disorders should be managed. Results: In all, 86.1 and 36.4% of participants had heard of depression and mania, respectively, with the most common source of information being relatives and friends. Over half of the participants attributed the possible causes of mood disorders to psychological trauma, pressure or stress in daily life, taking things too hard, and personality problems. Almost two-thirds of participants correctly labeled the depression vignette, but only 26.6% correctly labeled the mania vignette. The most common methods recommended by the participants as being helpful for the individuals portrayed in the vignettes were "traveling" and help-seeking from a psychological therapist/counselor, a psychiatrist, or a close family member or friend. Conclusion: The older individuals attending community healthcare service settings in Shanghai have good depression literacy but relatively poor mania literacy. However, most participants had a positive attitude toward psychiatric treatment for mood disorders.

[Injury characteristics and therapeutic strategy of patients injured in "8·8" Jiuzhaigou earthquake].

Objective: To summarize the injury characteristics and therapeutic strategy of patients injured in "8·8" Jiuzhaigou earthquake. Methods: The clinical data of 48 patients injured in "8·8" Jiuzhaigou earthquake who were admitted to Mianyang Central Hospital were analyzed retrospectively. There were 25 males and 23 females with an average age of 36 years (range, 5-87 years). The average interval from injury to admission was 30 hours (range, 3-53 hours). The patients from Sichuan province accounted for 45.8% (22 cases), from other province for 52.1% (25 cases), and from abroad for 2.1% (1 case). Patients were primarily hurted by collapsing houses and flying stones. Thirty-seven patients (77.1%) had single injury, mainly involving 36 patients (75.0%) in limbs, and the other 11 patients (22.9%) had multiple injuries. Ten patients (20.8%) had open fractures, including 1 case rated as typeⅠ, 2 as typeⅡ, 3 as type Ⅲa, 2 as type Ⅲb, and 2 as type Ⅲc according to Gustilo classification criteria. The abbreviated injury scale (AIS) score was 2-3 in 37 patients of single injury, and the injury severity score (ISS) was 8-22 (mean, 13.2) in 11 patients of multiple injuries. Sixteen patients (33.3%) were diagnosed as mental disorders by Hamilton rating scale for anxiety (HAMA), including 8 cases had their anxiety scores≥29, 4 cases of 21-28, 3 cases of 14-20, and 1 case of 7-13. Of the 16 patients, 2 showed suicidal tendency. Results: Except 2 referrals, 30 patients received operationï¼»28 patients (93.3%) for orthopaedic surgeriesï¼½and 16 patients received conservative treatment. The procedures included internal fixation, soft tissue debridement, external fixation, bipolar femoral head replacement, embolization of carotid cavernous sinus arteriovenous fistula, and amputation. Among the 46 patients treated in this hospital, 21 discharged from hospital at 2-12 days (mean, 6.7 days) after admission, the others received further rehabilitation in this hospital or local hospital. No undesirable consequence occurred in 16 patients with mental disorders. Five cases of infection occurred out of hospital were cured after debridement. No dead and nosocomial infection case reported. Conclusion: Intensive treatment, specialist management, multidisciplinary team, and early intervention of nosocomial infection and deep venous thrombosis are the key to improve the general level of successful earthquake medical rescue.

[Experimental study of targeting therapy of breast cancer with 131I-labeled epidermal growth factor].

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the effectiveness of (131)I-epidermal growth factor (EGF) on the proliferation of a heterologous graft in nude mice bearing human breast infiltrating duct carcinoma. METHODS: EGF/HAS was labeled with (131)I by chloramines-T method. Human breast cancer xenografts with positive EGFR expression were established in nude mice. The nude mice were injected with normal saline, Epirubicin Hydrochloride, (131)I-EGF, (131)I-HAS, (131)I intravenously and (131)I-EGF intratumoral administration respectively. The tumor growth inhibition rate was determined by measurement of tumor volume. Different examinations were carried out. RESULTS: There was remarkable significant difference of tumor volumes at 26th day among (131)I-EGF trial groups, (131)I, (131)I-HAS, and the negative control group. The tumor growth inhibition rate of (131)I-EGF trial groups was 82.0%, 80.7% respectively. Compared with the negative control group, the (131)I-EGF trial groups remarkably suppressed the growth of tumor (P < 0.05). Irreversible destruction of tissues in (131)I-EGF groups was observed under light and electron microscope. There was no evidence of hepatotoxicity, renal toxicity and myelotoxicity in nude mice bearing human breast cancer given (131)I-EGF over a 4-wk observation period. CONCLUSION: (131)I-EGF has obvious antitumor effects on a heterologous graft in nude mice bearing human breast infiltrating duct carcinoma, with little obvious side effects.

[Radiobiological effect of 131I radiolabeled recombinant human epidermal growth factor on nude mice with human breast cancer].

The radiobiological effect of 131I radiolabeled recombinant human epidermal growth factor (131I-rhEGF) on nude mice with human breast cancer was assessed in this study. The tissue mainly uptaking 131I-rhEGF was found by tissue distribution assay in mice. The radiation breakdown of the tissue greatly collecting 131I-rhEGF was examined by biochemical test and biopsy in nude mice with human breast cancer. The tissue distribution assay of 131I-rhEGF in mice showed that 131I-rhEGF greatly accumulated in kidney, liver, spleen and blood. The biochemical test and biopsy revealed that 131I -rhEGF injected twice (dosing once is analogous to 14.58 GBq in a person with 50 kg, once every 14 days) had an effective killing effect on tumor but had no effect of radiation breakdown on kidney, liver,spleen and blood-cell forming tissue in mice with human breast cancer. Therefore, 131I-rhEGF is a drug unharmful to normal tissues in the course of the receptor-mediated target radiotherapy for breast cancer.

Propofol suppresses proliferation and invasion of glioma cells by upregulating microRNA-218 expression.

Propofol (2,6-diisopropylphenol) is a commonly used intravenous anesthetic agent. The present study aimed to assess the effect of propofol on the proliferation and invasion of human glioma cells, and to determine the potential underlying molecular mechanisms. The effects of propofol on U373 glioblastoma cell proliferation, apoptosis and invasion were detected by an MTT assay, caspase­3 activity measurement and a Matrigel™ invasion assay, respectively. MicroRNA (miR)­218 expression and matrix metalloproteinase (MMP)­2 protein expression levels were analyzed by quantitative polymerase chain reaction and western blot analysis, respectively. In addition, miR­218 precursor was transfected into the cells to assess whether overexpression of miR­218 could affect MMP­2 expression. Anti­miR­218 was transfected into the cells to evaluate the role of miR­218 in the effects of propofol on the biological behavior of glioma cells. The results of the present study demonstrated that propofol significantly increased the expression levels of miR­218, inhibited U373 cell proliferation and invasion, and facilitated apoptosis. In addition, treatment with propofol efficiently reduced MMP­2 protein expression levels, and overexpression of miR­218 also decreased MMP­2 protein expression levels. Whereas, neutralization of miR­218 using the anti­miR-218 antibody reversed the effects of propofol on the biological behavior of U373 cells, and on the inhibition of MMP-2 protein expression. In conclusion, propofol may effectively suppress proliferation and invasion, and induce the apoptosis of glioma cells, at least partially through upregulation of miR-218 expression.

[Quantitative pathologic technique in prognostic identification of breast carcinoma with negative lymph node].

OBJECTIVE: To study the prognostic identification of lymph node negative breast carcinoma by quantitative pathologic technique. METHODS: Several morphometrical parameters, DNA content of cell nuclei were detected by means of a quantitative pathologic technique on 102 patients with lymph node negative invasive breast duct carcinoma. The effects of potential prognostic factors of lymph node negative breast cancer patients were assessed by Cox's proportional hazards regression model. RESULTS: DNA index, minimal diameter of nuclei, area of nuclei, maximal diameter of nuclei, and the perimeter of nuclei are important factors to influence the prognosis. CONCLUSION: Quantitative pathologic technique combined with valid statistical methods, as an objective means of assessing prognosis, may reliably improve the outcome in lymph node negative breast cancer.

[Experimental research into the inhibitory effect of 131I-recombinant human epidermal growth factor on the growth of breast cancer in vivo].

This experiment was designed to study the effect of 131I-recombinant human epidermal growth factor (131I-rhEGF) on the growth of tumor in nude mice loaded with human breast cancer. Bioactivity of 131I-rhEGF and uptake of 131I-rhEGF in breast cancer tissue were verified using biodistribution experiment of 131I-rhEGF in the nude mice loaded with human breast cancer. The effect of 131I-rhEGF on the growth of tumor was assessed via the growth experiment of tumor in the nude mice loaded with human breast cancer. The ultrastructural change of the tumor cell treated with 131I-rhEGF was observed under transmission electron microscope, and the pathological change of the tumor tissue treated with 131I-rhEGF was detected by biopsy. The results showed that the tumor tissue of nude mice bearing human breast cancer obviously takes in 131I-rhEGF; that intravenous administration and intratumoral administration of 131I-rhEGF both obviously inhibit the growth of tumor, the inhibition rates (82.00% and 80.70%) being remarkably higher than that of 131I (7.49%) and that of 131I-HSA (6.91%) (P<0.05); and that intravenous and intratumoral administration of 131I-rhEGF both obviously damage and kill tumor cells. Therefore, 131I-rhEGF can inhibit the growth of human breast cancer cell in nude mice; it is a potential receptor-mediated radioactivity targeting drug for treating breast cancer.