[AlaskaAngel]

To that I'll add that the assumption has been that the chemo works better on faster-dividing (aggressive) cancers, whether or not the trastuzumab does -- and breast cancer that is determined to be HER2 positive (HER2+++) is more often judged to be made up of faster-dividing cells.

Yet chemotherapy may not be as useful as combo monoclonal antibodies for some of these faster-dividing cells, if the information from the lapatinib-trastuzumab combo but no-chemo trial is accurate as more time goes by.

And there also may be some hormonal effect upon the fast-dividing cancer cells for those who are hormone-receptor positive, in that those patients tend to recur later than HR- patients, if they do recur, whereas if a HR- patient can get past the first few years they tend NOT to recur later on.

Mixed in with that is that we do not have information telling us how many patients may recur due to the chemotherapy itself or perhaps its support drugs or both.

A.A.