High efficacy of pre-operative trastuzumab combined with paclitaxel following doxorubicin & cyclophosphamide in operable breast cancer

2008 
Background. Trastuzumab in combination with adjuvant chemotherapy improves disease free survival and overall survival in HER2 over-expressing breast cancer patients. Data concerning the use of trastuzumab in the neo-adjuvant setting is limited. We aimed to compare outcome of HER2 over-expressing breast cancer patients treated with either standard chemotherapy, consisting of doxorubicin, cyclophosphamide and a taxane to outcome of patients treated with the same chemotherapy regimen with the addition of trastuzumab in concurrence with paclitaxel. Methods. We conducted a retrospective review of all consecutive HER2 over-expressing breast cancer patients treated at the participating institutions during the study period and received neo-adjuvant therapy. Allocation to trastuzumab was not based on clinical parameters and was approved only by part of the insurers. Clinical and pathological characteristics, as well as response rate and type of surgery were analyzed. Results. Thirty seven patients received chemoth...
    • Correction
    • Source
    • Cite
    • Save
    • Machine Reading By IdeaReader
    26
    References
    12
    Citations
    NaN
    KQI
    []