Elastosis and response to endocrine therapy in human breast cancer.

Response to endocrine therapy in 51 patients with advanced breast cancer was compared with the amount of elastosis in histological sections from their primary tumours. There appeared to be an association between elastosis and response: tumours with no elastosis showed a lower rate of response than those with gross elastosis, indicating that this simple method might provide a useful predictive index for response to endocrine therapy. In addition, tumours with oestrogen-receptor activity (a feature associated with a high rate of response) but with no elastosis were unlikely to respond, suggesting that a combination of the 2 predictive indices might be more valuable than either taken alone.