Bayer Her2 Serum Test and late Herceptin

[PatS]

I'm currently waiting for my onc to get back to me on whether or not my insurance will cover late herceptin ( diag . stage 3 & ended chemo Jan 2003). In the meantime I have been wondering, since my onc is very reluctant to give me late herceptin, if the new serum test would be of any benefit in determining whether or not doing late herceptin would be bebeficial for me. Also, if you do take herceptin for a year, don't you star overexpressing her2 once you stop herceptin?

Pat

[AlaskaAngel]

The short answer is that the test is more accurate if you have mets than it is if you don't.

From my reading, some serum tests indicate that the specificity is 95%, but the sensitivity varies by bc stage, being only 1.7% for stage I, 3% for stage II, 16.7% for stage III, and 35.5% for stage IV.

Here's something posted by Joe earlier when I was looking:

"There is a rather lengthy but informatine description of the test on our Articles of Interest section. Here is a link to it:"

www.her2support.org/carney.pdf (http://www.her2support.org/carney.pdf)