Genomics Guided Targeted Post-neoadjuvant Therapy in Patients With Early Breast Cancer (COGNITION-GUIDE)

In early breast cancer (eBC), pathological complete response (pCR) after neoadjuvant therapy acts as surrogate marker for metastasis and overall survival. Therapy intensification by adding an adjuvant therapy line (post-neoadjuvant treatment) substantially lowers the risk of relapse in high-risk breast cancer patients with residual disease after neoadjuvant treatment (non-pCR). While this approach was exemplified in two phase III trials without biomarker-stratification (CREATE-X, KATHERINE), even higher efficiency might be achieved by individualized genomic-guided post-neoadjuvant therapies. Within the seven-arm umbrella phase-II clinical trial COGNITION-GUIDE, we aim to deliver molecularly-tailored cancer care by implementing an additional response- and genomics-guided post-neoadjuvant therapy after finishing the guideline-compliant post-neoadjuvant treatment in high-risk breast cancer patients with residual cancer burden after neoadjuvant therapy to reduce the substantial risk of local and distant relapse. The trial evaluates not a single drug but rather a general strategy of precision oncology in the curative setting and provides the basis for future confirmatory biomarker-driven trials. Allocation to the therapy-arms is conducted by in depth molecular characterization of tumors within the COGNITION registry program. The study aims to show an overall benefit of the precision medicine approach in high-risk eBC patients and to allow for secondary exploratory evaluation of each study-arm. The primary endpoint of the study is invasive Disease-Free Survival (IDFS) after 4 years measured from surgery to local or distant relapse or death. The sample size of the entire trial is 240 eligible patients.