FAT-IBC: Facing adiposity in personalizing treatment of Inflammatory Breast Cancer patients.

Inflammatory breast cancer (IBC) represents a rare (~2,5% of all invasive breast cancers) but very aggressive form of locally advanced breast cancer. The term ‘inflammatory’ refers to the clinical presentation of the disease and not to the presence of inflammation in the tumor, although not excluded. Obesity is a risk factor for developing IBC and has also been associated with worse prognosis in IBC patients. Since around 1 woman out of 2 is overweight or obese in industrialized countries, it is crucial to understand how adiposity influences cancer biology, treatment efficacy, as well as disease progression in these patients. Here, we will firstly assemble a large European retrospective series of IBC treated with preoperative chemotherapy (n~800) to investigate whether overweight and/or obesity is associated with specific clinical and pathological characteristics, as well as with treatment efficacy. Secondly, using a prospective series, we will characterize IBC at the single-cell level and correlate the findings with different measures of adiposity. Finally, to unravel disease progression, we will characterize metastatic samples obtained from deceased IBC patients who have undergone a research autopsy in our institution. Altogether, this project will teach us if and to what extend adiposity-associated features could or should be used to personalize treatment for IBC patients.