Radiation therapy for the elderly—change of concepts in breast cancer?

The incidence of breast cancer in elderly patients has increased in the last years, perhaps due to better and earlier diagnostics and a longer life expectancy. Radiotherapy as a local adjuvant treatment after breast surgery, improves local control and overall survival. Due to frailty or comorbidity current guidelines cannot always be applied and the treatment decision-making process involving these older patients often remains the task of the treating physician rather than a fully established tumor board. The goal of this review is to summarize in short, the radiation therapy techniques available, and to outline the most important factors that could be relevant in the decision making for radiotherapy for elderly woman affected by invasive breast cancer.