HER2+ Breast Cancer

For further insight on the significance of palbociclib's approval, OncLive sat down with the lead investigator of PALOMA-1, Richard Finn, MD, from the Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center at UCLA.

Researchers will dissect topline results from the MARIANNE trial in the coming weeks in an effort to understand why T-DM1 (ado-trastuzumab emtansine; Kadcyla) failed to triumph as a first-line treatment in the metastatic setting for patients with advanced HER2-positive breast cancer despite the promise of earlier findings

Two HER2-targeting regimens anchored by T-DM1 (ado-trastuzumab emtansine; Kadcyla) failed to outperform the standard strategy in women with previously untreated advanced HER2-positive breast cancer in the MARIANNE trial, dealing a blow to efforts to move the drug into frontline settings.

When added to standard chemotherapy, trastuzumab not only dramatically improved disease-free survival rates for patients with metastatic disease, but also resulted in a clear survival advantage unprecedented for most treatments of metastatic breast cancer.

Among HER2-positive breast cancer patients treated with chemotherapy alone, women with high levels of stromal tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes had an 80% lower likelihood of disease recurrence compared to those with lower TIL counts.

Adding 1-year of adjuvant trastuzumab to chemotherapy continues to demonstrate an improvement in overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) for patients with early-stage HER2-positive breast cancer

Treatment with the antibody-drug conjugate T-DM1 (ado-trastuzumab emtansine; Kadcyla) has demonstrated promising clinical efficacy with lower toxicity across a variety of settings for patients with HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer when compared with standard therapies.

Frontline treatment with neratinib in combination with paclitaxel demonstrated similar ORR and PFS as the combination of trastuzumab and paclitaxel while lowering the incidence of CNS metastases in patients with locally recurrent or metastatic HER2-positive breast cancer.

Eleftherios Mamounas, MD, MPH, medical director, Comprehensive Breast Program, University of Florida Health Cancer Center, discusses the need to select patients for neoadjuvant chemotherapy.

Substantial clinical trial evidence supports the use of pathologic complete response (pCR) as a measure for evaluating neoadjuvant therapies for patients with HER2-positive breast cancer, suggesting that preoperative treatment should be the standard of care

Sandra M. Swain, MD, Medical Director of the Washington Cancer Institute at MedStar Washington Hospital Center, discusses a taxane's impact on outcomes in patients with HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer.

Recent research has shown that adding targeted agents to trastuzumab-based chemotherapy regimens in the adjuvant setting may not significantly improve outcomes in patients with early-stage HER2-positive breast cancer.

Pertuzumab and trastuzumab plus chemotherapy for the treatment of HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer improved median overall survival (OS) by 15.7 months over standard first-line therapy

A high level of tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) may be a marker of pathologic complete response (pCR) to neoadjuvant chemotherapy in breast cancer, especially in patients with triple-negative or HER2-positive disease

Dual HER2 blockade with pertuzumab and trastuzumab plus chemotherapy for the treatment of HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer improved median OS by almost 16 months over standard first-line therapy.

Sandra M. Swain, MD, discusses final overall survival analysis from the CLEOPATRA study of first-line pertuzumab, trastuzumab, and docetaxel for the treatment of patients with HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer.