European Medical Journal Oncology (Nov 2020)
Race Against Time: Addressing the Unmet Needs of Patients with HER2-Positive Metastatic Breast Cancer
Abstract
Over the last 20 years, there has been remarkable progress in the development of the therapies for human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 (HER2)-positive breast cancer (BC). Targeted treatment agents, such as trastuzumab, pertuzumab, lapatinib, and trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1), are currently recommended as key components in the standard of care regimens for patients with HER2-positive BC. However, some patients still develop disease progression despite using such therapies. Since brain metastases present an urgent unmet need in many women with HER2-positive BC, clinical studies focussing on novel strategies in this field are a high priority. This brief overview outlines some recent results from relevant clinical trials, such as HER2CLIMB, SOPHIA, and DESTINY-Breast01, in patients with HER2-positive metastatic BC, highlighting beneficial effects and safety issues of tucatinib, margetuximab, and trastuzumab deruxtecan (T-DXd), respectively. New research directions for the applications of these medications in combination with established treatment regimens are outlined. This article presents some insights into the potential transformation of clinical management and provides reasonable hope and encouragement to both the afflicted patients and their treatment teams.
