Survey of breast Cancer patients concerning their knowledge and expectations of adjuvant therapy

PURPOSEA survey of breast cancer survivors in the United States was conducted to define what they had been told about their prognosis and the value of adjuvant therapy, what they estimated their prognosis to be with and without adjuvant therapy, and what level of improvement they would have found minimally worthwhile.MATERIALS AND METHODSSurvey questionnaires were mailed to individual members and member organizations of the National Alliance of Breast Cancer Organizations (NABCO). Questionnaires were returned anonymously in prepaid mailers. Five hundred sixty-two women responded. Of these, the 318 women who received adjuvant chemotherapy were included in this analysis.RESULTSOnly 39% of the women recalled receiving quantitative estimates of their prognosis, and only 31% of women received a quantitative estimate both with and without adjuvant therapy. Sixty-eight percent of the women were able to provide a quantitative estimate for their outcome at 5 years both with and without adjuvant therapy. From these...