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Posted By:

April 14, 2008, 3:17 pm
Flag as Inappropriate gbyrd

Subject:

Brook Army Medical Researchers Find Breast Cancer Vaccine Reduces Mortality

Brook Army Medical is right down the road from my house so I thought I would give this a mention to support the home town.

They have found that clinical trials are indicating their HER2 peptide E75 vaccine is a success in reducing the risk of recurrence and cutting the mortality rate by half when cancer does recur.

Here is an expert:

The vaccine is most effective in low-expressing HER2-positive breast tumors in reducing the number of recurrences. There were no deaths at all associated with the cancer recurrence in the study group of women with this type of cancer who were vaccinated.

Linda C. Benavides, MD, general surgery resident at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas, says the vaccine may offer the hope of adjuvant therapy options for HER2 low-expressors, the most common form of breast cancer. Adjuvant therapy enhances the effect of the original treatment for cancer, which can include any one or combination of surgery, chemotherapy, or radiation. One common form of adjuvant therapy is with the drug trastuzumab, which is not indicated for low-expressing forms of breast cancer.

About 25% to 30% of all patients with early stage breast cancer have an over-expressed HER2. More than half of all cases of breast cancer are of the HER2 low-expressing type and not candidates for trastuzumab adjuvant treatment.