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PLOS One logoLink to PLOS One
. 2022 Nov 17;17(11):e0277194. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0277194

Five-year survival rate and prognostic factors in women with breast cancer treated at a reference hospital in the Brazilian Amazon

Soany de Jesus Valente Cruz 1,*,#, Andressa Karoline Pinto de Lima Ribeiro 2,#, Maria da Conceição Nascimento Pinheiro 3, Vânia Cristina Campelo Barroso Carneiro 4, Laura Maria Tomazi Neves 1,2,#, Saul Rassy Carneiro 1,2,#
Editor: Rubeena Zakar5
PMCID: PMC9671322  PMID: 36395094

Abstract

Breast cancer is the most prevalent malignant neoplasm and the leading cause cancer of death among women globally. In Brazil, survival rates vary according to the region and few studies have been conducted on breast cancer survival in less developed areas, such as the Amazon region. The aim of this study was to analyze the five-year survival rate and prognostic factors in women treated for breast cancer in the city of Belém in northern Brazil. A retrospective hospital-based cohort study was conducted (2007–2013). Sociodemographic, clinical/tumor, and treatment variables were obtained from the records at the Ophir Loyola Hospital. Survival analysis involved the Kaplan-Meier statistical method and Cox regression analysis was performed. The significance level was 5% (p <0.05). A total of 1,430 cases were analyzed. Mean survival time was 51.71 (± 17.22) months, with an estimated overall survival of 79.4%. In the multivariate analysis, referral from the public health care system, advanced clinical stage, lymph node involvement and metastasis were associated with worse prognosis and lower survival rate. Radiotherapy and hormone therapy were associated with increased survival. These findings can contribute to the development of regional strategies for early detection of breast cancer, reducing the incidence and mortality rates and increasing survival time.

Introduction

Breast cancer (BC) is the most prevalent malignancy and the leading cause of cancer death among women globally, accounting for 14.7% of all cancer-related deaths. The incidence and mortality rate related to BC continue to increase in both developing and developed countries [1, 2]. In Brazil, 15,403 deaths occurred due to BC in 2015 and it is estimated that 59,700 new cases occurred in the period 2018–2019, reaching an estimated risk rate of 56 cases per 100,000 women [3]. In Brazil, according to the Guidelines for the Early Detection of Breast Cancer, mammography is routinely recommended for women aged 50 to 69, once every two years. However, due to difficulties in accessing health services, misdiagnosis or delay in diagnosis can occur.

In the northern region of the country, BC is the second most incident form of tumor (19.21/100 thousand) following cervical cancer. The amazon region presents several barriers, from the great distances from the places to the treatment centers to the few specialists in oncology. The state of Pará is the second largest territory in Brazil and has a profound inequality in health services. These difficulties are the biggest problems for patients with breast cancer and make it very important to know the issues related to this population [3].

Several factors are associated with the prognosis of patients with BC, such as clinical stage [4], tumor size [5], and the condition of the axillary nodes [6], along with sociodemographic factors, such as age at diagnosis and education [7, 8]. Although advances in the therapeutic approach are associated with better survival, difficulties in gaining access to health care and a lack of knowledge on the part of the population exert negative impacts, which is why mortality rates for BC tend to be higher in developing countries compared to developed countries [9].

Regarding survival rates, reference countries in Europe and North America achieve five-year survival rates in excess of 80%. In Latin America, the survival rate for BC is approximately 70% [10, 11]. In Brazil, this rate varies among the different regions of the country, with a five-year survival rate of 72.1% in the central western region [12] to 87.7% in in the southern region [13]. However, few studies have analyzed breast cancer survival rates at hospitals in less developed areas of the country, such as the Amazon region.

The aim of the present study was to analyze the five-year survival rate and prognostic factors related to breast cancer in women at an oncological reference hospital in the city of Belém, which is the capital of the state of Pará and is located in the Brazilian Amazon region.

Materials and methods

A hospital-based retrospective cohort study using medical records was conducted with a sample of women diagnosed with breast cancer between January 2007 and December 2013 at the Ophir Loyola Hospital, which is classified as a high-complexity center in oncology by the National Cancer Institute. All data were fully anonymized before we accessed them and, therefore, the ethics committee waived the requirement for informed consent. This study received approval from the Human Research Ethics Committee of the Ophir Loyola Hospital in the study of Belém, state of Pará (certificate number: 2,682,659).

All female patients with breast cancer as the primary tumor from and living in the state of Pará with the diagnosis confirmed through histopathological or anatomopathological exams and who underwent treatment at the Ophir Loyola Hospital were included. Records with incomplete information were excluded. After searching the Hospital Cancer Registry, the patients were recruited and the necessary information was collected. Patient records were kept anonymous and identification was performed using numerical records.

The following sociodemographic variables were considered: age group (18–29 years, 30–39 years, 40–59, over 60 years), marital status (married, single, divorced, widowed), education (less than eight years, more than eight years), skin color (white, non-white), place of residence (Belém, interior of Pará), smoking (non-smoker, smoker/ex-smoker), and origin (public healthcare system, private healthcare system).

The clinical-tumor characteristics were lymph node involvement (yes, no), clinical stage (I/II, III/IV), histological type (infiltrating ductal carcinoma, carcinoma in situ, other histological types), tumor size (smaller than 2 cm, larger than 2 cm), and metastasis (yes, no). The variables related to treatment were time between diagnosis and start of treatment (less than 60 days, more than 60 days) and the type of therapeutic approach (surgery, radiotherapy, chemotherapy, hormone therapy).

Survival time was calculated as the interval between the date of diagnosis in the hospital record and the date of death or the end of follow-up. The maximum follow-up time was five years. The case of any patient who remained alive after this point was closed.

The data were entered onto spreadsheet of the Excel 2013 program (Microsoft Corporation, CA, USA). SPSS version 22.0 (International Business Machines, NY, USA) was used for data analysis and graphics. The Kaplan-Meier method was used to assess survival probabilities and the comparison of survival functions in relation to the variables was performed using the log-rank test. To estimate the effect of covariates, the Cox model of proportional risks was used, which estimates the proportionality of risks over the entire observation period. The research assumption is that there is an association between socioeconomic and clinical factors with the survival of patients with breast cancer. Variables with a p-value ≤0.20 in the univariate analysis were incorporated into the multivariate model [14]. Chi-square test was used to compare the cases included and excluded from the study. and missing. The significance level was set to 5% (p ≤0.05).

Results

The search for data returned a total of 2185 cases between 2007 and 2013. 23 records were excluded because of incomplete ascertainment; 78 cases were excluded for uncompleted clinical information (absence date of diagnosis and beginning of treatment) and 611 records were excluded because there were not any information about patient’s clinical stage at diagnosis. At the end, 1,430 (65.44%) records were included in the present study. Table 1 shows the comparison between sociodemographic and clinical variables of the included and excluded population.

Table 1. Comparison between sociodemographic and clinical variables of the included and excluded population in this study.

Variable Cases included n (%) Missing category n (%) p
Age 0.371
 18–29 30 (2.1) 21 (2.7)
 30–39 181 (12.6) 87 (11.5)
 40–59 775 (54.2) 392 (51.9)
 > 60 444 (31) 255 (31.9)
Skin color 0.002
 White 127 (9.5) 47 (15.6)
 Not white 1207 (90.5) 255 (84.4)
Education 0.090
 < 8 years 785 (62.3) 361 (58.5)
 > 8 years 469 (37.4) 246 (41.5)
Marital status 0.396
 Single 390 (26.3) 167 (23.3)
 Married 743 (54.3) 401(55.9)
 Widowed 174 (12.7) 103 (14.4)
 Divorced 92 (6.7) 46 (6.4)
Place of residence 0.735
 Metropolitan Belém 978 (68.4) 551 (67.6)
 Interior of Pará 451 (31.5) 244 (32.4)
Smoking 0.270
 Yes 485 (40.9) 290 (38.4)
 No 700 (59.1) 465 (61.6)
Origin 0.003
 Public healthcare 657 (49.1) 402 (57.7)
 Private healthcare 681 (50.0) 294 (42.3)
Clinical stage 0.512
 I/II 699 (48.9) 38 (45.2)
 III/IV 731 (51.1) 46 (54.8)
Histological type 0.159
 Infiltrating ductal carcinoma 1206 (84.3) 643 (85.2)
 Carcinoma in situ 16 (1.1) 15 (1.9)
 Others 208 (14.5) 97 (12.8)
Lymph node involvement 0.953
 Yes 661 (58.8) 137 (58.5)
 No 464 (41.2) 97 (41.4)
Tumor Size 0.094
 < 2 cm 146 (12.9) 38 (17.1)
 > 2 cm 985 (87.1) 184 (82.9)
Metastasis 0.347
 Yes 209 (19.2) 19 (15.7)
 No 878 (80.8) 103 (84.3)
Time between diagnosis and treatment 0.073
 < 60 days 560 (39.2) 236 (35.1)
 > 60 days 870 (60.8) 436 (64.9)
Surgery 0.251
 Yes 819 (57.3) 367 (54.6)
 No 611 (42.7) 305 (45.4)
Chemotherapy 0.057
 Yes 1076 (75.5) 470 (71.3)
 No 354 (25.8) 189 (28.7)
Radiotherapy 0.219
 Yes 808 (56.5) 325 (53.6)
 No 622 (43.5) 282 (46.4)
Hormone Therapy 0.078
 Yes 412 (28.8) 219 (32.6)
 No 1018 (71.2) 453 (67.4)

During the five-year follow-up period of this cohort, there were 294 deaths (20.55%) and the estimated overall survival rate was 79.4%. The mean age at diagnosis was 53.01 (± 13.13) years. Most patients were married (54.3%), had a low education (62.6%) and were non-white (90.5%), presenting lymph node involvement (58.8%), absence of distant metastasis (80.8%) and advanced clinical stage at diagnosis (51.1%). Table 2 display the complete distribution of sociodemographic, clinical-tumor, and treatment variables according to the result of the survival analysis, including the number of cases, number of deaths, survival global, and log rank test.

Table 2. Distribution of sociodemographic, clinical and treatment characteristics and survival analysis in women treated for breast cancer.

Belém, Pará, Brazil, 2007–2013.

Variable Cases n (%) Deaths n (%) Global Survival (%) Log Rank Test (p)
Age <0.001
 18–29 30 (2,1) 15 (50) 50
 30–39 181 (12.6) 40 (22.1) 77.9
 40–59 775 (54.2) 154 (19.9) 80.1
 > 60 444 (31) 85 (19.1) 80.9
Skin color 0.007
 White 127 (9.5) 39 (30.7) 69.3
 Not white 1207 (90.5) 236 (19.6) 80.4
Education <0.001
 < 8 years 785 (62.3) 209 (26.6) 73.4
 > 8 years 469 (37.4) 75 (16) 84%
Marital status 0.548
 Single 390 (26.3) 79 (21.9) 78.1
 Married 743 (54.3) 155 (20.9) 79.1
 Widowed 174 (12.7) 36 (20.7) 79.3
 Divorced 92 (6.7) 16 (17.4) 82.6
Place of residence 0.503
 Metropolitan Belém 978 (68.4) 197 (20.1) 79.9
 Interior of Pará 451 (31.5) 97 (21.8) 78.5
Smoking 0.971
 Yes 485 (40.9) 99 (20.4) 79.6
 No 700 (59.1) 143 (20.4) 79.6
Origin <0.001
 Public healthcare 641(48.5) 156 (24.3) 75.7
 Private healthcare 680 (51.5) 111 (16.3) 83.7
Clinical stage <0.001
 I/II 699 (48.9) 46 (6.6) 93.4
 III/IV 731 (51.1) 248 (33.9) 66.1
Histological type 0.088
 Infiltrating ductal carcinoma 1206 (84.3) 256 (21.2) 78.8
 Carcinoma in situ 18 (1.3) 0 100
 Others 206 (14.4) 38 (18.4) 81.6
Lymph node involvement <0.001
 Yes 661 (58.8) 201 (30.4) 69.6
 No 464 (41.2) 30 (6.5) 93.5
Tumor Size <0.001
 < 2 cm 146 (12.9) 0 100
 > 2 cm 985 (87.1) 231 (23.5) 76.5
Metastasis <0.001
 Yes 209 (19.2) 132 (63.2) 36.8
 No 878 (80.8) 90 (10.3) 89.4
Time between diagnosis and treatment <0.001
 < 60 days 560 (39.2) 158 (28.2) 71.8
 > 60 days 870 (60.8) 136 (15.6) 84.4
Surgery 0.115
 Yes 819 (57.3) 183 (22.3) 77.7
 No 611 (42.7) 111 (18.2) 81.8
Chemotherapy <0.001
 Yes 1076 (75.5) 254 (23.6) 76.4
 No 354 (25.8) 40 (11.3) 88.7
Radiotherapy 0.012
 Yes 808 (56.5) 150 (18.6) 81.4
 No 622 (43.5) 144 (23.2) 76.8
Hormone Therapy <0.001
 Yes 412 (28.8) 31 (7.5) 92.5
 No 1018 (71.2) 263 (25.8) 74.2

Regarding the sociodemographic factors, the analysis stratified by education showed that a higher education had a better overall five-year survival rate (84.4%) compared to a low education (73.4%) (p = 0.000). Patients under the age of 30 years had significantly lower survival rate compared to other age groups (p <0.001). Race (p = 0.007) and referral from the public healthcare system (p = 0.001) were also associated with a lower survival rate (Table 2).

Clinical stage was an important factor associated with survival (p <0.001): women diagnosed in early stages had an overall five-year survival rate of 93.4%, whereas those diagnosed in an advanced stage had a survival rate of 66.1%. A significant reduction in survival occurred in cases of lymph node involvement (p <0.001), tumor size larger than 2 cm (p <0.001), and distant metastasis (p <0.001) (Table 2).

Patients who started treatment up to 60 days after diagnosis had a survival rate of 71.8%, whereas those who started treatment after 60 days had a survival rate of 84.4% (p <0.001). The group that started treatment within the 60-day period had worse disease staging at diagnosis (62.5%) compared to those that started treatment after 60 days (41.9%). Radiotherapy (p = 0.012) and hormone therapy (p <0.001) exerted a positive influence on survival, with rates of 81.4% and 92.5%, respectively. Chemotherapy had a negative influence (p <0.001), with a survival rate of 76.4% (Table 2).

Based on these results, we performed Cox multivariate analysis to analyze the influence of each independent variable on survival time and found that clinical stage (p = 0.034), referral from the public healthcare system (p = 0.003), lymph node involvement (p = 0.001), metastasis (p <0.001), radiation therapy (p = 0.025), hormone therapy (p = 0.001), and time between diagnosis and treatment (p = 0.002) exerted significant impacts on survival (Table 3). Table 3 displays the final multivariate model of the overall five-year survival of women with breast cancer.

Table 3. Multivariate analysis of five-year overall survival of women with breast cancer.

Belém, Pará, Brazil, 2007–2013.

Variable RR (95% CI) p
Age
 18–29 1.84 (9.3–3.6) 0.078
 30–39 1.53 (9.3–2.5) 0.093
 40–59 1.20 (9.3–1.7) 0.321
 > 60 1
Education
 < 8 years 1.22 (0.83–1.78) 0.304
 > 8 years 1
Skin color
 White 1
 Not white 0.65 (0.42–1.0) 0.54
Origin
 Public healthcare 1.66 (1.18–2.34) 0.003
 Private healthcare 1
Clinical stage
 I/II 1
 III/IV 1.66 (1.03–2.67) 0.034
Tumor size
 < 2 cm 1
 > 2 cm 921 (000–1934) 0.919
Lymph node involvement
 Yes 2.35 (1.38–3.98) 0.001
 No 1
Histological Type
 Infiltrating ductal carcinoma 0.95 (0.60–1.50) 0.832
 Carcinoma in situ 0.00 (000–8.87) 0.968
 Others 1
Metastasis
 Yes 3.78 (2.64–5.40) <0.001
 No 1
Time between diagnosis and treatment
 < 60 days 1
  > 60 days 0.59 (0.43–0.82) 0.002
Hormone Therapy
 Yes 0.41 (0.24–0.68) 0.001
 No 1
Radiotherapy
 Yes 0.70 (0.51–0.95) 0.025
 No 1
Chemotherapy
 Yes 0.75 (0.45–1.23) 0.259
 No 1
Surgery
 Yes 0.88 (0.63–1.22) 0.460
 No 1

RR: Risk Ratio, CI: confidence interval, p <0.05

Discussion

Survival studies are important to determinate the distribution of resources and the identification of the main prognostic factors in a given region and population. However, few studies have analyzed the survival of women with BC in the Amazon region. The five-year survival rate for BC in this study was 79.4%. Other studies conducted in different areas of Brazil report lower rates [12, 15]. Moreover, the survival rate found in this study is higher than that reported for Latin America as a whole (70%), but still lower than that found in certain developed countries (85%) [10, 11].

Having been referred from the public healthcare system was the only socioeconomic variable that significantly influenced survival in this investigation. Similar result was found on a study conducted by the Brazilian Breast Cancer Research Group using different hospital-based records [16]. The worse prognosis of women at public services is related to the diagnosis in advanced stage, with more cases probably detected clinically and fewer detected by screening. Such findings underscore the occurrence of social inequalities and disparities regarding the primary and secondary prevention of BC. Thus, there is a need for structuring and expanding the public network on different levels of health care, with a focus on screening and early detection [17, 18].

Lymph node involvement and the presence of metastases have been associated with a lower survival rate, as reported in previous studies [19, 20]. Regarding the clinical stage, 51.1% of the patients had advanced tumors at the time of diagnosis. Smaller percentages were found in other Brazilian states [21, 22]. A similar pattern was described by Renna Junior and Silva (2018) [23], who state that women treated in the northern region of Brazil are more likely to have advanced tumors at diagnosis compared to those treated in the southern and southeastern regions due to differences in access to healthcare services and the implementation of cancer prevention programs. In general, however, Brazilian women are at greater risk of being diagnosed with advanced breast cancer and at a younger age compared to those in high-income countries [24].

In 2012, a federal law established that cancer patients in the public healthcare system should be treated within an interval not exceeding 60 days (Law N° 12.732 2012) [25]. In this study, 60% of the sample started treatment beyond this period. In addition, we found a higher survival rate among those individuals. This result is explained by the clinical stage at diagnosis; 62.5% of the patients who began treatment within the 60-day period were diagnosed in advanced stages compared to 41.9% of those seen after the time. Advanced stage tumors are more resistant to treatment and the therapeutic options are more limited, which increases the risk of death [26]. Results of this nature underscore the need for screening and early diagnostic services in Brazil, where socioeconomic and logistical barriers compromise mammographic screening, resulting in high rates of BC at an advanced stage at diagnosis.

Radiotherapy and hormone therapy were associated with an increase in the survival rate. Adjuvant radiotherapy has been identified as improving the prognosis after surgical treatment and its omission is associated with decreased survival [27, 28]. The use of adjuvant hormone therapy reduces the risk of local recurrence by half and increases survival [29]. A Canadian study concluded that radiotherapy associated with tamoxifen reduces the risk of the axillary recurrence of BC as well as axillary recurrence after quadrantectomy in women with small tumors, negative armpits and positive hormone receptors [30].

This study has some limitations. The retrospective design increases the possibility of missing clinical data in the patient records. As the data were obtained from a secondary source, the analyses were restricted to the information provided in the Hospital Cancer Registry. Moreover, the underreporting of diseases in the state of Pará cannot be ignored, especially in the interior of the state, as a significant number of patients are not registered and die without diagnosis and treatment.

This research has an important role for public health in the Amazon region. The multivariate analysis shows that, referral from the public health system, advanced clinical stage, lymph node involvement and metastasis were associated with worse prognosis and lower survival rate. Radiotherapy and hormone therapy were associated with increased survival. These findings may contribute to the development of regional breast cancer prevention strategies, reducing mortality rates and increasing survival time.

Supporting information

S1 Data

(XLSX)

Acknowledgments

Universidade Federal do Pará—Pró-Reitoria de Pesquisa e Pós-Graduação.

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES).

Hospital Universitário João de Barros Barreto–Gerência de Ensino e Pesquisa.

Data Availability

All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting information files.

Funding Statement

The author(s) received no specific funding for this work.

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Decision Letter 0

Rubeena Zakar

26 Jul 2021

PONE-D-21-12167

Five-year survival rate and prognostic factors in women with breast cancer treated at a reference hospital in the Brazilian Amazon

PLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Valente Cruz,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

Please submit your revised manuscript by 29th August 2021. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

  • A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.

  • A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.

  • An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Rubeena Zakar, Ph.D

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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Additional Editor Comments (if provided):

[Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.]

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Partly

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

5. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: The paper estimates absolute and relative 5-year survival following breast cancer diagnosis in a hospital in the Brazilian Amazon. Only 65% of found cases were included in the analysis. A major concern of the findings is the potential for selection bias differential by patient prognosis.

Major Comments:

1) The authors included 65% (1,430) of the 2,185 cases found in the analysis. This selection needs to be better described.

a) Are these exclusions of records with incomplete information, as per page 3, line 80-81? If so please, provide a breakdown of the numbers excluded because of incomplete mortality ascertainment versus missing covariate information?

b) Please demonstrate that the population excluded is not different from those included in a table 1 comparing characteristics of the two populations (include a missing category) with the appropriate statistical test (chi-square test for categorical variables, Mann-Whitney U test for continuous variables).

Minor comments:

Tables require some double-checking. Comma instead of decimal in the first row of table 1; global survival inconsistently including/not including % in tables 1 and 2; and the decimal places seem to be in the wrong places in the RR column of table 3.

Reviewer #2: The main limitation with this study is that it is hospital-based rather than population-based, nor does there appear to be any population-based data to compare cases in this study with the number of cases in the region. The conclusions of the study therefore are only applicable to women able to access hospital care. Was data on hormone receptor status available? If it is available it would have been an interesting variable to also look at. In model 3 there are 0 cases (seen in Table 2) in some of the cells for tumour size and carcinoma without infiltration . This can make the model unstable. Was any analysis done of correlation between variables? I suspect that some of the variables may be highly correlated and therefore may be able to be excluded from the model.

**********

6. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: Yes: Li C. Cheung

Reviewer #2: No

[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

PLoS One. 2022 Nov 17;17(11):e0277194. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0277194.r002

Author response to Decision Letter 0


20 Sep 2021

Reviewer: 1

We inform in a new table 1 of the requested information. We compared both populations as requested, and it appeared in table 1. The authors reviewed all the data in the tables as requested.

Reviewer: 2

There were no records on hormonal receptor in the medical records, perhaps because the clinical laboratory of the hospital is not able to do this type of analysis.

About the tumor size in table 2, we noticed that there were no deaths with small tumors, perhaps because it was an early stage of the disease so that it could be more likely to increase survival, but this variable was not important in the adjustment in regression analysis (table 3).

Attachment

Submitted filename: Response to Reviewers.docx

Decision Letter 1

Rubeena Zakar

26 Nov 2021

PONE-D-21-12167R1Five-year survival rate and prognostic factors in women with breast cancer treated at a reference hospital in the Brazilian AmazonPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Jesus Valente Cruz,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

Please submit your revised manuscript by 7th January 2022. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

  • A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.

  • A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.

  • An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Rubeena Zakar, Ph.D

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

[Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.]

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #3: (No Response)

**********

2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #3: Partly

**********

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #3: I Don't Know

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

**********

5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

**********

6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: (No Response)

Reviewer #3: Cruz S et al. have reported ' Five-year survival rate and prognostic factors in women with breast cancer treated at a

reference hospital in the Brazilian Amazon'. It is good that the authors try to report an important public health issue in a more neglected area in South America, but there are some weak points in the study that makes it suboptimal:

1. if the idea of authors is to provide an awareness about the status of diagnosis and treatment of BC and yo show their concern about delays they need to explain the currently existing policies and screening programs in the region. Given the specific localization, some information about the culture and the behavior of patients in the region is useful to help to accept the conclusion about the needs for screening and early diagnosis programs

2. There is very poor information about nature of BC tumors in the region in the provided data. There is a general classification of 'infiltrating ductal' versus 'others' with a strange line of 'carcinoma with no infiltration'. What this statement exactly mean? Are the authors talking about carcinoma in situ? Why this needs to be mentioned as an independent category given its very low number (expected). Also it does not fit with the clinical stages provided, CIS of breast is Tis. As soon as breast mass of 1mm, it is already T1 (AJCC, 2018).

3. Infiltrating ductal carcinoma is a big category that covers multiple molecular subtypes that are diagnosed based on IHC and the type of treatment is based on that categorization. Is that mean that in Belem there s no information at all about molecular subtypes or at least the status of HR?

4. Tumor size >2 cm is not really a good indicator of 'T' element in TNM staging, it covers a range of T2 to T4. If such data is not available, then how data on lymph node and metastasis (the combination to define stage of BC) is reliable?

5. It is not clear how the % are calculated: as only one example: The authors report the final sample size (after exclusions) =1430, Table one reports 661 with LN involvement that makes it 46.2%, how the authors end up to 58.8% ? Additionally, how 137 (58.5%) missing data is calculated?

6. Can authors give a short definition about how they categorize the patients to white or non-white and what criteria do they use?

**********

7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #3: No

[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

PLoS One. 2022 Nov 17;17(11):e0277194. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0277194.r004

Author response to Decision Letter 1


7 Jan 2022

Reviewer: 1

Reviewer #1: Cruz S et al. have reported ' Five-year survival rate and prognostic factors in women with breast cancer treated at a reference hospital in the Brazilian Amazon'. It is good that the authors try to report an important public health issue in a more neglected area in South America, but there are some weak points in the study that makes it suboptimal:

1. if the idea of authors is to provide an awareness about the status of diagnosis and treatment of BC and yo show their concern about delays they need to explain the currently existing policies and screening programs in the region. Given the specific localization, some information about the culture and the behavior of patients in the region is useful to help to accept the conclusion about the needs for screening and early diagnosis programs.

Our response: We add the requested information.

2. There is very poor information about nature of BC tumors in the region in the provided data. There is a general classification of 'infiltrating ductal' versus 'others' with a strange line of 'carcinoma with no infiltration'. What this statement exactly mean? Are the authors talking about carcinoma in situ? Why this needs to be mentioned as an independent category given its very low number (expected). Also it does not fit with the clinical stages provided, CIS of breast is Tis. As soon as breast mass of 1mm, it is already T1 (AJCC, 2018).

Our response: We used the classification of the Brazilian Society of Clinical Oncology, which classifies the histology of breast cancer between carcinoma in situ and infiltrating carcinoma.

3. Infiltrating ductal carcinoma is a big category that covers multiple molecular subtypes that are diagnosed based on IHC and the type of treatment is based on that categorization. Is that mean that in Belem there s no information at all about molecular subtypes or at least the status of HR?

Our response: Our research used only data from medical records. However, many of these records were old and did not contain this type of information. Furthermore, the hospital does not carry out this type of analysis, being carried out in external laboratories. This analysis is often not attached to the medical record, making it difficult to investigate this topic.

4. Tumor size >2 cm is not really a good indicator of 'T' element in TNM staging, it covers a range of T2 to T4. If such data is not available, then how data on lymph node and metastasis (the combination to define stage of BC) is reliable?

Our response: We have the data available, however we chose to classify the tumor size between smaller and larger than 2cm to establish the tumor at an early or advanced stage in the statistical analysis.

5. It is not clear how the % are calculated: as only one example: The authors report the final sample size (after exclusions) =1430, Table one reports 661 with LN involvement that makes it 46.2%, how the authors end up to 58.8% ? Additionally, how 137 (58.5%) missing data is calculated?

Our response: Some medical records contained information about one variable and not about another. So, the analysis took into account the variable that is contained in the medical record. So, in some cases, the proportions don't match. The missing data corresponds to numbers excluded because of incomplete mortality ascertainment versus missing covariate information

6. Can authors give a short definition about how they categorize the patients to white or non-white and what criteria do they use?

Our response: According to Brazilian law, the identification of race or color must respect the user's self-declaration criteria.

Attachment

Submitted filename: Response to Reviewers.docx

Decision Letter 2

Rubeena Zakar

29 Jun 2022

PONE-D-21-12167R2Five-year survival rate and prognostic factors in women with breast cancer treated at a reference hospital in the Brazilian AmazonPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Valente Cruz,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

Please submit your revised manuscript by 13th August 2022. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

  • A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.

  • A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.

  • An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Rubeena Zakar, Ph.D

Section Editor

PLOS ONE

[Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.]

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #3: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #4: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #5: (No Response)

**********

2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #3: Partly

Reviewer #4: Partly

Reviewer #5: Yes

**********

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: No

Reviewer #5: No

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

Reviewer #5: Yes

**********

5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

Reviewer #5: Yes

**********

6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #3: Thanks for your replies. While your reply to my first review question regarding the current status of BC in the region and a summary of the cultural points that might affect the prognosis of this cancer is 'this data is added', I could not find any addition in the revised version with tracking pointing this question. If you have addressed this question, please be sure if it is done through tracking facility to be found.

Reviewer #4: Thank you very much.

This is an interesting investigation on the breast cancer and the authors have used a survival analysis methodology. The manuscript is generally well structured.

However, it has some shortcomings in regards to some data analyses and narrations.

Below I have provided remarks on the analysis as it is often vague and long-winded.

• The test used is Kaplan-Meier statistical method and Cox regression analysis

However, no information is provided about the assumption tests.

• Why mean survival time? , why not median survival time?

Given these shortcomings the manuscript requires major revisions

Reviewer #5: This article entitled “Five-year survival rate and prognostic factors in women with breast cancer treated at a reference hospital in the Brazilian Amazon” aimed to analyze the five-year survival rate and prognostic factors in Northern Brazilian women from 2007-2013. A total of 1,430 cases were analyzed in this study and in multivariable analysis, referral from public healthcare system, advanced clinical stage, lymph node involvement, and metastasis, were associated with lower survival rates. Overall, the study is important in highlighting this public health issue/disparity in this region of Brazil. While overall the authors did a nice job, there are several areas in the study that could be addressed for clarity.

Abstract/Introduction

1. The authors state in both the abstract and introduction that BC is the leading cause of death among women globally. I would suggest to clarify that to “leading cause of cancer death among women globally”

2. There are font/size discrepancies in the introduction (lines 54-56).

3. Is there a citation for (line 54-56)- early detection of breast cancer in Brazil?

4. What constitutes difficulties in accessing healthcare? Lack of doctors/specialists? Distance to office? Healthcare (public versus private)? Combination of all the above?

Methods

1. Are there any inclusion/exclusion criteria for selection based on clinical factors (other than breast cancer as the primary tumor)?

2. Could be beneficial for clarity to include citation from Hosmer and Lemeshow to describe the univariate variable selection criteria (p<0.2). (Hosmer DW, Lemeshow S, Sturdivant RX. Applied logistic regression. New York: John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated, 2013.)

3. How are deaths defined for the survival analysis? Was it all-cause mortality? Breast cancer related deaths adjudicated by a physician?

4. It may be beneficial to include a section about the variables and how some variables were defined (e.g. why 2 cm tumor size? Is that a proxy to early/late stage clinical stage?)

5. For histological type, why focus on just infiltrating ductal carcinoma and carcinoma in situ? What comprises “others”? Is this due to the detail in the medical records? Any thought about stratifying analysis by histological type for sensitivity analyses?

6. It is not stated in the paper if the proportional hazards assumptions were violated. Also, were there tests for multicollinearity? It seems that several of the tested variables would be strongly correlated (e.g., tumor size & clinical stage; clinical stage & lymph node involvement & metastasis)- all of which made it to the final model.

Results

1. Why the comparison between the missing and included data in Table 1?

2. What source is the global % coming from in Table 2?

3. Argument would benefit from more explanation on the final model (e.g., “lymph node involvement more than doubles the risk of breast cancer in this population (HR= 2.35 [1.38-3.98]; Table 3).”

Discussion

1. There really is no conclusion/summary at the end of the paper

**********

7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #3: No

Reviewer #4: Yes: Likawunt Samuel Asfaw

Reviewer #5: No

**********

[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

Attachment

Submitted filename: Reviewer comment.docx

PLoS One. 2022 Nov 17;17(11):e0277194. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0277194.r006

Author response to Decision Letter 2


3 Aug 2022

Reviewer #3: Thanks for your replies. While your reply to my first review question regarding the current status of BC in the region and a summary of the cultural points that might affect the prognosis of this cancer is 'this data is added', I could not find any addition in the revised version with tracking pointing this question. If you have addressed this question, please be sure if it is done through tracking facility to be found.

Our response: We add and track the requested information.

Reviewer #4: Thank you very much. This is an interesting investigation on the breast cancer and the authors have used a survival analysis methodology. The manuscript is generally well structured. However, it has some shortcomings in regards to some data analyses and narrations. Below I have provided remarks on the analysis as it is often vague and long-winded.

• The test used is Kaplan-Meier statistical method and Cox regression analysis. However, no information is provided about the assumption tests.

Our response: We add the requested information.

• Why mean survival time? , why not median survival time? Given these shortcomings the manuscript requires major revisions.

Our response: For this case, the estimated survival probability must never have reached 50%, that is, the survival step function does not cross the line y=.5. The Kaplan-Meier estimate, especially since it is a non-parametric method, makes no inference about survival times (i.e., the shape of the survival function) beyond the range of times found in the data. Mean survival time, on the other hand, is a statement about the observed times. It shouldn't be taken to mean the length of time a subject can be expected to survive.

Reviewer #5: This article entitled “Five-year survival rate and prognostic factors in women with breast cancer treated at a reference hospital in the Brazilian Amazon” aimed to analyze the five-year survival rate and prognostic factors in Northern Brazilian women from 2007-2013. A total of 1,430 cases were analyzed in this study and in multivariable analysis, referral from public healthcare system, advanced clinical stage, lymph node involvement, and metastasis, were associated with lower survival rates. Overall, the study is important in highlighting this public health issue/disparity in this region of Brazil. While overall the authors did a nice job, there are several areas in the study that could be addressed for clarity.

Abstract/Introduction

1. The authors state in both the abstract and introduction that BC is the leading cause of death among women globally. I would suggest to clarify that to “leading cause of cancer death among women globally”.

Our response: We correct it.

2. There are font/size discrepancies in the introduction (lines 54-56).

Our response: We correct it.

3. Is there a citation for (line 54-56)- early detection of breast cancer in Brazil?

Our response: There is no citation, it is a point of reflection raised by the authors

4. What constitutes difficulties in accessing healthcare? Lack of doctors/specialists? Distance to office? Healthcare (public versus private)? Combination of all the above?

Our response: We add the information required.

Methods

1. Are there any inclusion/exclusion criteria for selection based on clinical factors (other than breast cancer as the primary tumor)?

Our response: The authors chose only this criterion because they aimed to analyze as many variables as possible.

2. Could be beneficial for clarity to include citation from Hosmer and Lemeshow to describe the univariate variable selection criteria (p<0.2). (Hosmer DW, Lemeshow S, Sturdivant RX. Applied logistic regression. New York: John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated, 2013.)

Our response: To build the final regression model and establish the independent variables that influenced survival time, we used the method to include the most important predictors from the p-value (0.2) observed in the univariate analysis. We included the citation.

3. How are deaths defined for the survival analysis? Was it all-cause mortality? Breast cancer related deaths adjudicated by a physician?

Our response: Deaths recorded in the medical records of the breast cancer service were considered. The authors did not distinguish the type of death so as not to incur errors.

4. It may be beneficial to include a section about the variables and how some variables were defined (e.g. why 2 cm tumor size? Is that a proxy to early/late stage clinical stage?)

Our response: The 2cm criterion is established by the staging currently used as a limit. We chose to classify the tumor size between smaller and larger than 2cm to establish the tumor at an early or advanced stage in the statistical analysis.

5. For histological type, why focus on just infiltrating ductal carcinoma and carcinoma in situ? What comprises “others”? Is this due to the detail in the medical records? Any thought about stratifying analysis by histological type for sensitivity analyses?

Our response: We chose this division because it is very precise in terms of the location of the tumor in a single layer of tissue or when the tumor already presents an invasion behavior from other locations (even if they are other layers).

Others means other types of cancer than breast carcinomas, we chose not to stratify this variable too much since they represent 14.5% of the total sample.

It did not occur to the authors to carry out this type of analysis, but we will take this as a suggestion for future research.

6. It is not stated in the paper if the proportional hazards assumptions were violated. Also, were there tests for multicollinearity? It seems that several of the tested variables would be strongly correlated (e.g., tumor size & clinical stage; clinical stage & lymph node involvement & metastasis)- all of which made it to the final model.

Our response: The authors analyzed by the kaplan meier curves, since they are in parallel, the proportional risk is satisfied. We verified by the correlation matrix of the cox model coefficients and observed that there was no correlation above 0.47.

Results

1. Why the comparison between the missing and included data in Table 1?

Our response: The authors wanted to demonstrate the summary of patients who were not involved in the analysis and compare with those who were analyzed.

2. What source is the global % coming from in Table 2?

Our response: Means the survival of each variable stratum

3. Argument would benefit from more explanation on the final model (e.g., “lymph node involvement more than doubles the risk of breast cancer in this population (HR= 2.35 [1.38-3.98]; Table 3).”

Our response: The authors intended to be more objective and allow for a more fluid reading. We will take this suggestion for future manuscripts.

Discussion

1. There really is no conclusion/summary at the end of the paper

Our response: We add the information required.

Attachment

Submitted filename: Response to Reviewers.docx

Decision Letter 3

Rubeena Zakar

24 Oct 2022

Five-year survival rate and prognostic factors in women with breast cancer treated at a reference hospital in the Brazilian Amazon

PONE-D-21-12167R3

Dear Dr. Valente Cruz,

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements.

Within one week, you’ll receive an e-mail detailing the required amendments. When these have been addressed, you’ll receive a formal acceptance letter and your manuscript will be scheduled for publication.

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Rubeena Zakar, Ph.D

Section Editor

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Reviewers' comments:

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Reviewer #3: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #4: All comments have been addressed

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The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Partly

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Reviewer #3: I Don't Know

Reviewer #4: Yes

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Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

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Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

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Reviewer #3: Cruz et al analysed the status of BC in a Brazilian amazon region. The authors replied to questions and comments during two level of reviews. Thanks

Reviewer #4: Thank you for revising the manuscript. Most of the comments are addressed, but for clarity I recommend using reading proofing software for the manuscript. Please use median survival time instead of mean survival time is possible.

Good luck!!!

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Reviewer #3: No

Reviewer #4: Yes: Likawunt Samuel Asfaw

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Acceptance letter

Rubeena Zakar

8 Nov 2022

PONE-D-21-12167R3

Five-year survival rate and prognostic factors in women with breast cancer treated at a reference hospital in the Brazilian Amazon

Dear Dr. Cruz:

I'm pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been deemed suitable for publication in PLOS ONE. Congratulations! Your manuscript is now with our production department.

If your institution or institutions have a press office, please let them know about your upcoming paper now to help maximize its impact. If they'll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team within the next 48 hours. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information please contact onepress@plos.org.

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on behalf of

Dr. Rubeena Zakar

Section Editor

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    All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting information files.


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