【Objective】Whether preoperative cancer antigen 15-3 (CA 15-3) and carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) levels can forecast prognosis of various luminal subtype operable breast cancer treated with toremifene remain unknown. In this study

we retrospectively investigated the relationship between CA 15-3

CEA

clinicopathological characteristics

and patient outcomes in these group patients. 【Methods】A total of 368 early breast cancer patients who underwent surgery and treated with toremifene as adjuvant endocrine therapy between 2000 and 2009 at Sun Yat-sen University Cancer Center were analyzed. Chi-square test or Fisher exact test was used to compare categorical data when appropriate. Kaplan-Meier method was used to construct disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) curves

and the log-rank test was used to evaluate the statistical significance of differences. Univariate and multivariate Cox analyses and stratified analysis were performed to identify prognostic factors for DFS and OS. 【Result】Among 368 patients

elevated preoperative CEA and CA 15-3 levels were identified in 29 and 47 patients

respectively. Elevated preoperative CEA and CA 15-3 level were associated with axillary lymph node status

Her2 status

and adjuvant radiotherapy. The prognosis of patients with higher CEA and CA 15-3 concentrations was worse than that of those with serum tumor markers (STMs) normal. Multivariate analysis and stratified analysis indicated that elevated preoperative CA 15-3 levels were independent prognostic factors for DFS in luminal A-like and luminal B-like (HER2-negative) patients. 【Conclusion】 Preoperative CA 15-3 and CEA elevated were associated with worse clinical outcome in patients with luminal A-like and luminal B-like (HER2-negative) molecular subtype. CA 15-3 and CEA elevated were associated with worse clinical outcome in patients with luminal A or luminal B (HER2-negative) molecular subtype.