Surgery has survival benefits for male Stage IV breast cancer patients who are receptive to systemic therapy

The National Comprehensive Cancer Network guidelines to treat men with Stage IV breast cancer recommend systemic therapy, with surgery to be used to minimize symptoms such as ulcerations, pain, or bleeding, said first author Kelly A. Stahl, MD, a surgical resident at Penn State College of Medicine, Hershey. However, new study findings, show that surgery does have survival benefits for men with Stage IV breast cancer, she said.

"We need to re-examine the notion that Stage IV breast cancer in men is so dire that there is no survival benefit to surgical intervention," said Daleela G. Dodge, MD, FACS, a general surgeon at Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center in Hershey, PA, and a co-author of the study.

"For this subgroup of patients who are responsive to systemic therapy and do not have a lot of metastatic burden, we'd like there to be a reconsideration of best practices."