New Treatments

Herceptin

Until very recently, the drug Herceptin (generic, trastuzumab) was only approved to treat metastatic breast cancer, which is cancer that has spread from the breast to other parts of the body.

Herceptin is a targeted therapy that attacks cancer cells that "over-express," or make too much of, a protein called HER2. Herceptin is only effective for the approximately 20 to 25 percent of women with breast cancer whose cancer is HER2-positive.

Because it is a targeted treatment that only attacks cancer cells, the side effects are milder than those of conventional chemotherapy, which attacks all fast-growing cells. However, the side effects of Herceptin do include an increased risk of heart problems, including congestive heart failure.

New research
As a result of new research studies, doctors have begun to use Herceptin to treat women who have been newly diagnosed with HER2-positive breast cancer. Herceptin is recommended for these women as an adjuvant (post-surgery) treatment in combination with chemotherapy.

Three new research studies on the use of Herceptin to treat women with early-stage, HER2-positive breast cancer found that the drug was very effective in keeping these women’s cancer from returning. In fact, it cut the risk of recurrence of this aggressive type of breast cancer in half.

This research has received a great deal of attention in the press, and you may have read about it. If you are newly diagnosed with breast cancer, ask your doctor if Herceptin might be right for you.

You may want to read more about this research:

• Read a press release from the National Cancer Institute.
• The drug’s manufacturer, Genentec, has a patient information section on its web site.
• Read an article about herceptin in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

For more information on new treatments:

• Donut mastopexy
• Hormonal therapy
• New ways of giving chemotherapy: dose density
• Neoadjuvant chemotherapy

August 2007