[Usefulness of ambulatory adjuvant chemotherapy with low-dose epirubicin in patients with axially-node positive breast cancer: Chiba Epirubicin Cooperative Study Group].

We evaluated the usefulness of adjuvant chemotherapy with low-dose epirubicin (EPI) as a key drug in patients with axially-node positive breast cancer. All the 24 patients who were entered in the study between January 1991 and December 1992 were shown histologically to have more than 4 axially-node involvement and underwent curable resection for the breast lesions. Twenty mg/m2 of EPI was administered intravenously every 4 weeks as ambulatory treatment for 1 year and 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) and tamoxifen (TAM) were concomitantly administered at a dose of 150 mg/day and 20-40 mg/day, respectively, daily for 2 years. The median follow-up period was 70 months with a 55.1% 5-year relapse-free survival and 67.4% 5-year survival rate. One patient developed Grade 3 nausea.vomiting, anorexia and general fatigue; however, the other toxicities were mild, such as Grade 1 leukopenia, liver dysfunction, nausea.vomiting, anorexia and general fatigue. This adjuvant therapy with low-dose EPI was safely administered to outpatients, and is considered to be useful for the treatment of axially-node positive breast cancer.