Table 4. Multivariate analysis for relapse-free and cause-specific overall survival at 5 years.

Variable	Overall survival
Number of lymph nodes	P<0.0001
Grade 2 or 3 neutropenia	P=0.0377
ER poor/negative	P<0.0001
XRT to supraclavicular fossa	P=0.0169
Mastectomy	P=0.004
XRT to primary site	P=0.041

Proportional-hazard analysis was performed for all patients who completed six courses of CMF chemotherapy. All patient-related, pathological and treatment-related variables, including pathological tumour size, were entered into the model and the analysis was performed by backward elimination. Only 497 patients were included in the analysis, due to incomplete information on some variables; in particular, grade was not available for 136 patients and ER status for 60 patients. Those variables having a significant effect on cause-specific survival are shown in the table; ER, Oestrogen receptor; XRT, Radiotherapy.