How did the researchers find out if Herceptin was effective ?
The use of Herceptin has been well establised in patients with metastatic breast cancer overexpressing HER-2/neu. More recently, the early results of three multicentre randomized trials have been presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology assessing the use of Herceptin in the adjuvant setting for breast cancer (i.e. for the prevention of a recurrence). In these trials, women with HER-2/neu positive early stage breast cancer treated with chemotherapy were either randomized to receive or not receive Herceptin.Women who received Herceptin had a significantly lower rate of breast cancer recurrences when compared to those who did not receive it.
