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RADIOTHERAPY

Intraoperative radiotherapy for early breast cancer — insufficient evidence to change practice

We argue that the evidence remains insufficient for use of intraoperative radiotherapy (IORT) in women with early stage breast cancer outside of a clinical trial, as the recently reported TARGIT-A trial does not provide sufficient evidence to conclude that IORT is superior to no radiotherapy.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank professors Jack Cuzick (biostatistics), Alastair Thompson (surgery) and Andrew Tutt (clinical radiotherapy) for discussions and suggestions in the preparation of this manuscript.

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Correspondence to Peter D. Sasieni.

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Sasieni, P.D., Sawyer, E.J. Intraoperative radiotherapy for early breast cancer — insufficient evidence to change practice. Nat Rev Clin Oncol 17, 723–724 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41571-020-00444-2

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