Herceptin adjuvant

I recently read a post about using herceptin before stage 4. Is it really 9% increased survival? I guess i thought it would be higher then that. Has anyone heard anything different? Ive been trying to get statistics on this for a year with no luck. I don't understand why they aren't letting them out.

Michelle,

That was me that posted that percentage. Basically I got it from the literature on one trial that was using Herceptin with earlier stages. This is what they are hoping to achieve but can't say for certainty this will occur. It may be higher (we hope) or lower. You have to remember that in the patients of the trial there will be people that don't respond to Herceptin anyway. Let's say there are 1000 people in the trial and only 30% respond to Herceptin. A 9% increase in survival would equate to 90 more people being NED for 5 years. 90 taken into the 300 that responded would be a 30% increase! I think they probably used the standard 25% or so of women who respond to Herceptin when they figured this out. However, remember that trial that was going on at MD Anderson that they stopped early and had all the women get Herceptin because of the excellent rate of response? That gives me great hope that the number will be much higher after all.
Does any of this make sense? I hope so!
Peace, Ruth

Ruth,
I wish they had a test to know if you were the "30%" that was to respond to herceptin. I have been on it since march. I hope i am that % but when do we know? HOw long do you have to be disease free to say you responded? There are so many ?'s that they can't answer. I read one Dr. Love article that stated that they don't think HER 2 is as deadly as they used to think, then you read genetech's website that HER 2 means we will live 50% less then HER 2 neg. Who do we believe?

Michelle
Statistics with only a 5 year study of Herceptin that has evolvled in only a few years is hard to rely upon as a concrete indicator at present. But it does show alot more sirvival and less relapse possibilities in the future. Statistics is only as good as the sample size and accuracy of the study based on many medical protocols with the use of Herceptin. It s really too early to be exact , BUT you must realize the last 5 years Herceptin has saved lives, and those statistics are not accurate as yet and should belower than it really is.
In Dec we will be attending the San Antoinio BC Symposium, and hope to come back with more information to report with better insight into the future of HER2neu, hopefully with better indications and positive outlook.
Warm Hugs, Christine