Locally advanced breast cancer with bleeding - two cases effectively treated with bevacizumab plus weekly paclitaxel.

ABSTRACT

Bleeding is one of the serious adverse events of bevacizumab (BV). In our report, two patients had locally advanced breast cancer with bleeding. They received BV plus weekly paclitaxel (PTX), and good local control was observed. Case 1 The patient was a 50-year-old postmenopausal woman. She had left-sided breast cancer (T4cN2cM1 [bone]-stageIV) that was negative for estrogen receptor (ER), negative for progesterone receptor(PgR), and 1+for human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2). The patient began receiving different regimens of chemotherapy 5-fluorouracil (5-FU), epirubicin (EPI), and cyclophosphamide(CPA), (FEC); PTX; docetaxel (DTX); and gemcitabine (GEM) plus PTX. Subsequently, she received BV plus PTX. The tumor was markedly reduced in size at the completion of 2 cycles. Bleeding and exudate were also reduced. The patient had a partial response until the sixth cycle, and good local control was obtained. However, the patient had progressive disease at the completion of 8 cycles. Therefore, therapy was changed to capecitabine(CAP)plus CPA, but the patient died one year after she began treatment with BV plus PTX. Case 2 The patient was a 76-year-old postmenopausal woman. She had right-sided breast cancer (T4bN3bM1[lung]-stageIV) that was negative for ER, negative for PgR, and 0 for HER2. The patient began receiving different regimens of chemotherapy EPI and CPA (EC); and PTX. Subsequently, she received BV plus PTX. The tumor was markedly reduced in size at the completion of 2 cycles. Bleeding and exudate were also reduced. The patient had a partial response until the third cycle, and good local control was obtained. However, the patient had progressive disease at the completion of 4 cycles. Therefore, therapy was changed to CAP and DTX, but the patient died six months after she began treatment with BV plus PTX.