NCI trial reported targeted agent trastuzumab and standard chemo cut risk of HER-2-positive breast cancer

On Apr. 25, 2005, the combination of the targeted agent trastuzumab (Herceptin) and standard chemotherapy cuts the risk of HER-2-positive breast cancer recurrence by more than half compared with chemotherapy alone. The result comes from two large, National Cancer Institute sponsored, randomized trials testing, as adjuvant therapy, a trastuzumab/chemotherapy combination against chemotherapy alone in women with invasive, early stage, HER-2 positive breast cancer. For women with this type of aggressive breast cancer, the addition of trastuzumab to chemotherapy appears to virtually reverse prognosis from unfavorable to good.

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Source: New England Journal of Medicine
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