Blood eosinophilic relative count is prognostic for breast cancer and associated with the presence of tumor at diagnosis and at time of relapse

Background: Cancer outcome is associated with circulating immune cells, including eosinophils. Here we analyze the relative eosinophil count (REC) in different breast cancer subtypes.

Methods: Stage I-III breast cancer patients were included in the study and classified as REC-high vs low (cutoff 1.5%) or relative lymphocyte count (RLC)-high vs low (cutoff 17.5%). The co-primary endpoints were the breast cancer-specific survival (BCSS) or the time to treatment failure (TTF) in the REC groups.

Results: Overall 930 patients were included in the study. We observed a benefit for REC-high vs REC-low in TTF (HR 0.610, 95% CI 0.458-0.812), and in BCSS (HR 0.632, 95% CI 0.433-0.923). Similarly, we observed a better TTF (HR 0.421, 95% CI 0.262-0.677) and BCSS (HR 0.350, 95% CI 0.200-0.614) in RLC-high vs low. A lower relapse rate was observed in the REC-high vs REC-low group (17.1% vs 24.7%, p = 0.005), not confirmed in the multivariate analysis. A lower median REC at baseline and at relapse was observed compared to REC after surgery and during cancer-free follow-up (p < .0001).

Conclusions: REC could be a new promising, affordable and accessible predictive and prognostic biomarker in all breast cancer subtypes.