Women Cancer Health Treatment

Women who take Herceptin, the advanced breast cancer “wonder drug”, could suffer heart problems as a result, research has indicated. The researchers say that 28% of women receiving the novel breast cancer drug Herceptin (trastuzumab) suffered cardiac problems as a result. The affected women had to stop taking the cancer drug temporarily while their heart problems were treated.
The drug Herceptin is thought to reduce the chance of relapse in women with certain types of early stage breast cancer. But at a cost of up to $70,000 per year, it is out of reach for some patients. Previous evidence from clinical trials found that between 10% and 26% of patients experienced cardiac problems, depending on its combination with other drugs. One frequently cited US study found that 18.6% of women had to stop taking the drug because of cardiac problems.

Herceptin, also known as trastuzumab, works by targeting the HER2 protein, which can fuel growth of breast tumours in women with HER2 positive breast cancer, a protein which makes cancers more aggressive. This accounts for about 25 per cent of all breast cancer cases. The US Food and Drug Administration warned last year that Herceptin could result in congestive heart failure, leading to inability to pump enough blood throughout the body, or a dysfunction in the heart’s ventricle chamber.
Herceptin, which is sold in the U.S. by Genentech Inc. (DNA), is the Swiss company’s second-best selling drug. In the six months to June, Herceptin sales more than doubled to CHF1.81 billion.

“These long-term cardiac side effects of Herceptin can be managed, and the drug is safe to use,” says lead researcher Francisco Esteva, professor of oncology at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, a hospital that specializes in cancer treatment in Houston, US. Esteva’s study is the first to find out the situation in real clinics where women are receiving the drug in an everyday medical setting.
His team followed 173 patients who had taken Herceptin for at least a year after undertaking chemotherapy to combat secondary cancers. After follow-ups averaging almost three years, of these, 46 patients experienced cardiac toxicity potentially associated with heart failure, and three patients experienced an asymptomatic, but significant, decrease in ventricle function.
All but three patients improved cardiac function by discontinuing Herceptin and using such cardiac treatments as beta-blockers and ACE inhibitors, which are generically available drugs that treat high blood pressure.

After repairing the damage, patients could then resume Herceptin treatment, Esteva said.
“The drug substantially prolongs survival, and while we found substantial cardiac toxicity, we also discovered that this side effect can be successfully treated, which was not clearly known before this study,” says Esteva. “If the cardiac side effects of Herceptin treatment can be managed, the drug is safe to use.”
The drug is licensed in the UK for both early and advanced breast cancer.