[Debbie L.]

Thanks, as always, for keeping us up to date, Lani.

I don't know if it's me, or the write-up, or what -- but I was confused by the article. Cancer stem cells (which may like to hang out in bone) are not the same thing as bone mets, right?

Ever since they've been talking about Herceptin having efficacy for cancers that are not HER2 positive, I've been wondering several things. Do we know the answers to these questions, or who to ask?

1. Back when they were first starting with Herceptin, how did they decide what level of HER2 positivity was enough to be called positive? Was it in a petri dish, a mouse, a human? I know they determined initially that the level of HER2 positivity didn't predict response, so how did they arrive at a cut-off?

2. Were there never any clinical trials that compared HER2- and HER2+ responses to Herceptin? Not just the tumor response itself, but the survival and/or progression-free survival? If so, were those metastatic trials or adjuvant ones?

3. Could this (Herceptin gets the stem cells) explain the apparent cures (or at the least, the very longterm remissions) now being seen in some women with HER2+ stage IV cancers? Does it imply that this possibility of curing some stage IV disease may not be limited just to HER2+ cancers?

Debbie Laxague