now this is the kind of repetition that is appreciated--herceptin works!
 

at the EMSO Conference in Lugano another reiteration of the most recent HERA results reconfirms:

Analysis confirms benefits of combining trastuzumab and chemotherapy [European Society for Medical Oncology]
A recent meta-analysis of five major breast cancer trials has confirmed that combination treatment with the antibody trastuzumab and chemotherapy improves survival in women with operable HER-2 positive breast cancer.
At the ESMO Conference Lugano, Issa Dahabreh from the University of Athens reported the results of a meta-analysis of 5 trials involving more than 13,000 women whose breast cancer was amenable to surgery.
All the trials compared disease-free survival, overall survival and the risk of locoregional and distant recurrence of breast cancer in women given adjuvant chemotherapy alone or chemotherapy plus trastuzumab, after breast surgery.
Up to a quarter of all breast cancers express large amounts of the HER2 protein or carry multiple copies of the HER2 gene. Those cancers tend to be associated with aggressive disease, a higher likelihood of recurrence and a decreased response to treatment. Trastuzumab is a monoclonal antibody that directly targets part of the HER2 tyrosine kinase receptor.
The results showed that combining trastuzumab with chemotherapy results in a -34% reduction in mortality and a 38% increase in disease-free survival, Dahabreh said. Those survival benefits were accompanied by decreases in the risk of both locoregional and distant recurrences of the cancer.
"Taken together, these results confirm that the administration of trastuzumab in combination with chemotherapy should be the standard choice for the treatment of women with HER2 positive early stage disease, especially those with limited cardiovascular comorbidities", Dahabreh said.
This is the first meta-analysis of current published trials on the adjuvant use of trastuzumab. The results are of great clinical value since they indicate that treatment with trastuzumab results in major survival benefit in women with an aggressive disease subtype.
The level of effectiveness demonstrated by this analysis is largely unprecedented in the treatment of solid tumors, the authors say, and highlights the potential of implementing targeted agents with cytotoxic chemotherapy.

Someone should tell Dr. Hudis.

Hopeful

Hi Hopeful,
I wanted to know a little bit more about Dr. Hudis. Was he opposed to Herceptin or what...please explain...
anyone else has any experiences with Dr. Hudis.
I was thinking of taking a 2nd opinion from him.
Regards,
Rupali

thanks, Lani! What a sweet gift at a time it was needed!
Thank you so much for your contribution of this article and your determination to stay on top of the "truth"! ma

Rupali,

My reference about Dr. Hudis was to this thread: http://her2support.org/vbulletin/sho...rid=1173<br />. If you read it, it is self-explanatory.

Hopeful

more on Lugano presentation of Meta-analysis
 

European Society for Medical Oncology Conference Lugano 2007
Meta-Analysis Shows Major Benefit From Addition of Trastuzumab to Chemotherapy in Breast Cancer


July 10, 2007 – For women with operable HER2-positive breast cancer, the addition of the monoclonal antibody trastuzumab (Herceptin, Genentech) to chemotherapy results in a 34% reduction in mortality and a 38% increase in disease-free survival, concludes a new meta-analysis. The combination also has an advantage in reducing disease recurrence compared with the use of chemotherapy alone.
"Taken together, these results confirm that the administration of trastuzumab in combination with chemotherapy should be the standard choice for the treatment of women with HER2-positive early-stage disease, especially those with limited cardiovascular comorbidities," says lead researcher Issa Dahabreh, a sixth-year medical student from the University of Athens, Greece. He was presenting the new findings at the annual meeting of the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO), in Lugano, Switzerland.

The results are of great clinical value, Mr. Dahabreh commented, since they indicate that treatment with trastuzumab results in a major survival benefit in women with an aggressive disease subtype. HER2-positive tumors account for around 25% of breast cancer and tend to be associated with aggressive disease, a higher likelihood of recurrence, and a decreased response to treatment.

"One has to remember that a meta-analysis of published clinical trials has a largely exploratory character and cannot distinguish which patients will derive the greatest benefit from treatment; on the other hand, the high statistical significance of the results show the magnitude of the benefit," Mr. Dahabreh commented in an interview.

"It's very unusual in oncology to show such a large effect with such a short follow-up (2 to 3 years)," he commented. "It's very rare to have such a highly statistically significant benefit in favor of a new treatment."

First Meta-Analysis of Adjuvant Use of Trastuzumab

This meta-analysis, the first to be conducted on published trials on the adjuvant use of trastuzumab, investigated data for 14,079 women. It included 5 published clinical trials, as follows: the HERA trial (Smith I et al. Lancet. 2007;369:29-36); combined analysis of the NSABP B-31 trial and the NCCTG N9831 trial (Romond EH et al. N Engl J Med. 2005;353:1673-1684; updated at American Society of Clinical Oncology 43rd Annual Meeting); the BCIRG-006 trial (presented at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium 2006), and the FinHER trial (N Engl J Med. 2006;354:809-820).

At the meeting, Mr. Dahabreh presented an analysis of data from the latest updates on these trials, which showed that the addition of trastuzumab to chemotherapy had a highly statistically significant effect on:

Disease-free survival; relative risk (RR) = 0.62, or a risk reduction of 38% (based on data from all 5 trials).
Overall survival; RR = 0.66, or 34% reduction in the risk for death (data from all 5 trials).
Locoregional recurrence of disease; RR = 0.58, or a 42% reduction in risk (data from 3 trials).
Distant recurrence; RR = 0.6, or a 40% risk reduction (data from all 5 trials).
However, the addition of trastuzumab was associated with an increased risk for serious cardiac adverse events compared with the use of chemotherapy alone (RR = 7.779; 95% CI 4.024 – 15.037). Mr. Dahabreh commented that the number of cardiovascular events was much smaller than the number of events related to breast cancer, and so the confidence intervals for these findings are much wider.

Approached for comment on this research, Dick Schrijvers, MD, from the Ziekenhuisnetwerk Antwerpen Middelheim, in Antwerp, Belgium, who acted as a moderator at the ESMO press conference, told Medscape: "This preliminary meta-analysis confirms the results of phase 3 studies showing that addition of trastuzumab in HER2-positive breast cancer patients improves disease-free and overall survival in the adjuvant setting when added to chemotherapy."

However, Dr. Schrijvers also pointed out that the meta-analysis showed up an "increased cardiotoxicity of this treatment approach," which needs to be evaluated further, as the aim is to improve long-term survival of patients in a "good clinical condition."

European Society for Medical Oncology 2007 annual meeting: Abstract 29p. Presented July 7, 2007.