Endometrial cancer worse in African-American women

African-American women with advanced endometrial cancer appear to have more aggressive tumors than Caucasian women, which may explain worse outcomes even when they receive the similar care, according to the results of a new study.

"Our research suggests that biologic reasons may underlie the more aggressive nature of endometrial cancers in African-American patients," explained Dr. Larry Maxwell, of the Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Washington, DC.

Maxwell, who presented the findings here on Monday at the Society of Gynecologic Oncologists' 36th Annual Meeting on Women's Cancer, and colleagues, conducted a review of four clinical trials conducted by the Gynecologic Oncology Group.

In particular, they focused on the outcome of African-American women with endometrial cancer.

The researchers compared data for 168 African-American women and 997 Caucasian women with advanced or recurrent endometrial cancer.

The investigators found that African-American patients were significantly more likely than Caucasian patients to have advanced stage disease and more aggressive tumor types. Both African-American women and Caucasian women received similar treatment regimens of chemotherapy.

In addition, Maxwell's team found that overall survival was significantly worse among African-American women - an average of 10.6 months compared with 12.2 months for Caucasians. Even after investigators controlled for characteristics such as age, disease status and tumor grade and treatment, African-American patients still had shorter survival times.

"These findings confirm the racial disparity in survival between these two groups even when patients receive similar treatment. Future research may focus on identifying better therapies for high-risk minority groups," Maxwell concluded.