San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium Goes Virtual

2020 Symposium Features First Virtual Program, Draws Record Attendance

For the first time in its 43-year history, the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium was held virtually — with a record crowd from 92 countries participating in the world’s leading scientific conference for basic scientists, physician-scientists, clinical investigators and breast care providers.

Founded and operated by UT Health San Antonio, the symposium provides an exchange of new information in experimental biology, etiology, prevention, diagnosis, and therapy of premalignant breast disease and breast cancer. Since 1977, the annual conference has grown into a five-day event attended by an international audience of academic investigators and private physicians who attain information through abstract presentations, panel discussions, research findings, and state-of-the-art educational sessions.

Virginia G. Kaklamani, MD, DSc, clinic leader for breast oncology at the Mays Cancer Center, said the COVID-19 pandemic may have forced her and fellow symposium directors to make the decision to go to a virtual platform, but “we had the largest audience it has ever had with 9,331 participants from 92 countries. I believe this was the best year we have ever had. A great deal of research was presented on all kinds of breast cancers as well as early diagnosis of breast cancer.”

Presentations by Mays Cancer Center experts included:

Clinical Research Workshop moderated by Dr. Kaklamani included presenters from around the country and England. She serves as the Ruth McLean Bowman Bowers Chair in Breast Cancer Research and Treatment and the A.B. Alexander Distinguished Chair in Oncology.
Special Session on Global Breast Cancer Screening was moderated by Ismail Jatoi, MD, PhD, Dale H. Dorn Chair in Surgery and professor of surgical oncology and endocrine surgery at UT Health San Antonio, with experts from India and France.
Manjeet K. Rao, PhD, co-leader of Experimental and Developmental Therapeutics for the Mays Cancer Center, participated in a DNA Damage Repair Educational Session.

Highlights of the 2020 virtual symposium included:

Priya Rastogi, MD, associate professor at the University of Pittsburgh Department of Medicine and medical director of the National Surgical Adjuvant Breast and Bowel Project Foundation in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, shared that extended follow-up data from the phase III monarchE trial showed that adding the cyclin-dependent kinase (CDK) inhibitor abemaciclib (Verzenio) to standard adjuvant endocrine therapy continued to improve invasive disease-free survival among patients with high-risk, node-positive, early-stage, HR-positive, HER2-negative breast cancer.
Kevin Kalinsky, MD, MS, director of the Glenn Family Breast Center at Winship Cancer Institute of Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, presented data from the SWOG S1007 RxPONDER clinical trial revealing after a median follow-up of 5.1 years, among women with lymph node-positive early-stage breast cancer and a recurrence score of 25 or lower who received adjuvant endocrine therapy with or without chemotherapy, postmenopausal patients had no added benefit from chemotherapy, while premenopausal patients who received chemotherapy had improved invasive disease-free survival and an early indication of improved overall survival.
Reshma Jagsi, MD, DPhil, deputy chair of the Department of Radiation Oncology and director of the Center for Bioethics and Social Sciences in Medicine at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan, shared findings that among patients with breast cancer treated with radiotherapy, under-recognition of symptoms was common in reports of pain, pruritus, edema, and fatigue, with younger patients and black patients having significantly increased odds of symptom under-recognition.
Jacob Cogan, MD, a fellow in hematology/oncology at New York-Presbyterian/Columbia University Irving Medical Center in New York, presented his study’s finding that women who receive mastectomy and reconstructive surgery as part of breast cancer treatment may face the risk of developing persistent use of opioids and sedative-hypnotic drugs. The study showed that short-term exposure to opioids can lead to long-term dependence.
Wolfgang Janni, MD, PhD, a professor and director of the women’s clinic at Ulm University Hospital in Ulm, Germany, shared meta-analysis with attendees that early circulating tumor cell dynamics were associated with overall survival in patients with metastatic breast cancer. Dr. Janni and his colleagues investigated the potential of circulating tumor cells (CTCs), which are shed from the primary tumor into the bloodstream, to predict overall survival.
Ian Kunkler, FRCPE, professor of clinical oncology at the Western General Hospital, University of Edinburgh, United Kingdom, presented updated 10-year data from the PRIME II study showing that older patients with hormone receptor-positive breast cancer who did not receive radiation therapy after breast-conserving surgery had higher rates of local recurrence but similar 10-year survival rates when compared to patients who received postoperative radiation therapy.
Matteo Lambertini, MD, PhD, adjunct professor in medical oncology at the University of Genova–IRCCS Policlinico San Martino Hospital in Genova, Italy, presented data from a large meta-analysis of breast cancer survivors of childbearing age indicated that they are less likely than the general public to get pregnant, and they face higher risk of certain complications such as preterm labor. However, most survivors who do get pregnant deliver healthy babies and have no adverse effects on their long-term survival.

UT Health San Antonio, with co-sponsors the Dan L. Duncan Comprehensive Cancer Center at Baylor College of Medicine and the American Association for Cancer Research, supports the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium.

For more information on the symposium, visit www.sabcs.org.