• Douglas W Arthur, Kathryn Winter, Robert R Kuske, John Bolton, Rachel Rabinovitch, Julia White, William F Hanson, Raymond M Wilenzick, and Beryl McCormick.
• Department of Radiation Oncology, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA 23298-0058, USA. DArthur@mcvh-vcu.edu
• Int. J. Radiat. Oncol. Biol. Phys. 2008 Oct 1; 72 (2): 467-73.

PurposeRadiation Therapy Oncology Group 95-17 is a prospective Phase II cooperative group trial of accelerated partial breast irradiation (APBI) alone using multicatheter brachytherapy after lumpectomy in select early-stage breast cancers. Tumor control and survival outcomes are reported.Methods And MaterialsEligibility criteria included Stage I/II breast carcinoma confirmed to be <3 cm, unifocal, invasive nonlobular histology with zero to three positive axillary nodes without extracapsular extension. APBI treatment was delivered with either low-dose-rate (LDR) (45 Gy in 3.5-5 days) or high-dose-rate (HDR) brachytherapy (34 Gy in 10 twice-daily fractions over 5 days). End points evaluated included in-breast control, regional control, mastectomy-free rate, mastectomy-free survival, disease-free survival, and overall survival. The study was designed to analyze the HDR and LDR groups separately and without comparison.ResultsBetween 1997 and 2000, 100 patients were accrued and 99 were eligible; 66 treated with HDR brachytherapy and 33 treated with LDR brachytherapy. Eighty-seven patients had T1 lesions and 12 had T2 lesions. Seventy-nine were pathologically N0 and 20 were N1. Median follow-up in the HDR group is 6.14 years with the 5-year estimates of in-breast, regional, and contralateral failure rates of 3%, 5%, and 2%, respectively. The LDR group experienced similar results with a median follow-up of 6.22 years. The 5-year estimates of in-breast, regional, and contralateral failure rates of 6%, 0%, and 6%, respectively.ConclusionPatients treated with multicatheter partial breast brachytherapy in this trial experienced excellent in-breast control rates and overall outcome that compare with reports from APBI studies with similar extended follow-up.

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