Herceptin treatment lowers recurrence rate in early breast
cancer
October 20, 2005
Laptop Battery Encouraging results for women with aggressive Her2-positive
disease
Dr. Kaelin's warm, Understand your diagnosis and choose a care team Identify your treatment options and make informed decisions Look and feel your best during and after treatment Maintain good health after breast cancer Lower your chances of a recurrence of breast cancer.
Thinkpad BRUSSELS-The targeted drug trastuzumab, or Herceptin, previously
shown to prolong survival in advanced breast cancer, dramatically
reduced the chances of recurrence in patients with early-stage
disease when given for one year following standard
chemotherapy.
IBC has an extremely high risk of recurrence and a very poor prognosis. It is the most lethal form of breast cancer. To improve the chances of survival it is important that symptoms are recognized early, resulting in an immediate diagnosis and treatment. Chemotherapy is usually begun within days of diagnosis. Without treatment, year survival for individuals with inflammatory breast cancer are very poor. With treatment, about 50% of patients will be living 5 years after diagnosis.
Microsoft These are the encouraging findings in an interim report from
HERA, an ongoing large, international clinical trial of Herceptin,
being published today in the New England Journal of Medicine. The
analysis was led by Richard Gelber, PhD, of Dana-Farber Cancer
Institute, who led the statistical analysis for the HERA trial,
which is one of the largest breast cancer trials to date. It
includes more than 5,000 patients in 39 countries.
Breast cancer cases in women are estimated to total more than 178, 480 and result in more than 40, 460 deaths according to the American Cancer Society. Though new methods for breast cancer detection are being developed and breast cancer survival rates are increasing, there is still a need to spread awareness and raise funds for breast cancer research. Right now there is no way to prevent breast cancer, but early detection gives breast cancer patients the best chance for survival. exams and yearly mammograms are two of the best methods for early breast cancer detection.
Laptop Computers Women whose tumors were HER2-positive - that is, overexpressing
a protein associated with more aggressive cancer and poorer
outcomes - had approximately a 50 percent lower risk of disease
recurrence. This translated into an 8 percent improvement in the
number of women who were free of disease two years after beginning
the treatment.
Antioxidants May Reduce Risk of Breast Cancer Recurrence By Darin Ingels, ND Healthnotes Newswire (October 23, 2003) Women who have had breast cancer may lower their risk of having a recurrence by taking supplemental vitamins C and E, according to a study in Nutrition and Cancer (2003; 15 22). The benefit of these antioxidants was only observed in women who had been taking them for more than three years.
Laptop Computer "This is probably the biggest evidence of a treatment effect
I've ever seen in oncology," says Gelber. "It is quite remarkable."
Harold Burstein, MD, PhD, of Dana-Farber, wrote in a commentary
published with the report that the results have "a profound lesson:
not all breast cancers are the same." The study shows the success
of therapy tailored to a specific biological form of the
disease."Now we have made dramatic progress for patients with
HER2-positive breast tumors, who now have a much lower risk of
recurrence and better chance of survival because of trastuzumab,"
says Burstein.
While dietary fat, especially saturated fat, may play a role in breast cancer, fat diet also causes weight loss. Studies repeatedly link being overweight with a greater risk of postmenopausal breast cancer and breast cancer recurrence. In the Nurses’ Health Study, large weight gains after a diagnosis of breast cancer correlated with a 64 percent greater risk of recurrence; smaller weight gains led to smaller increases in risk.
Desktop Computer The interim data were released last May at the annual meeting of
the American Society of Clinical Oncology, prompting standing
ovations from cancer specialist attending the conference.
Notebooks Herceptin is a monoclonal antibody-based drug developed
specifically to block the activity of the HER2 protein, a growth
factor receptor that is overexpressed on cancer cells of an
estimated 20 to 30 percent of breast cancer patients. HER2-positive
tumors, which can be identified with a test when the breast cancer
diagnosis is made, are generally more aggressive and prone to
spreading, and are resistant to many chemotherapy agents.
Lenovo The HERA trial, sponsored by Roche, the manufacturer of
Herceptin, and carried out by the Breast International Group (BIG),
a federation of international breast cancer clinical trial
cooperative groups, began enrolling patients in 2001. The aim is to
determine whether Herceptin treatment improves outcomes in early
HER2- positive breast cancer when added to standard chemotherapy.
More than 5,000 women had surgery and various types of chemotherapy
drugs before entering the trial. About two-thirds had cancer that
had spread to the underarm lymph nodes.
Hard Drive One group of 1,694 patients received Herceptin every three weeks
for one year; another 1,694 received it for two years. No Herceptin
was administered to the third group of 1,693 patients.
Travelstar Recurrences in HER2-positive breast cancer tend to happen in the
first year or two. When the statisticians took their first look at
the data after one year, the benefits in the Herceptin group were
already apparent. "The differences showed up so quickly that the
Data Monitoring Committee felt that data had to be released, even
though we don't know the long term effects and the long term side
effects," says Gelber.
Gateway There were 220 recurrences in the group that did not receive
Herceptin, compared with 127 in the group treated for one year with
Herceptin. The group receiving the drug had a significant
improvement in disease-free survival of 8.4 percent at two years.
Disease-free survival is the length of time after treatment during
which patients show no signs of the disease. Overall survival in
the groups did not differ by a statistically significant amount,
but that could change as the study continues, the researchers say.
The study is planned to run through 2008.
Laptop Parts The researchers were gratified to discover that only 0.5 percent
of the patients receiving Herceptin had serious cardiac side
effects. It was a concern because in previous trials combining
chemotherapy with Herceptin the rate had been significantly higher.
The scientists said that the lower incidence of cardiac side
effects in the HERA Trial may be related to the facts that
Herceptin was administered after chemotherapy treatment had been
completed, instead of simultaneously, and that patients with
insufficient cardiac function after chemotherapy were not
included.
Software Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
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