Dr. Jagielska on Long-Term Survival With Lapatinib Plus Capecitabine in HER2+ Breast Cancer

Beata Jagielska, MD, PhD, internist, Centrum Medyczne Damiana Warsaw, discusses long-term survival with lapatinib (Tykerb) plus capecitabine in patients with HER2-positive breast cancer.

The first results from the Polish Breast Cancer Treatment Programme were presented at the 2018 ESMO Congress. This program is a government policy that was created to offer a uniform, national therapeutic system for the treatment of patients with advanced HER2-positive breast cancer. The data presented at the congress were long-term results from patients who underwent anti-HER2 palliative therapy with lapatinib plus capecitabine.

Over 1000 patients with advanced HER2-positive breast cancer were enrolled on this program. The median progression-free survival was 6.4 months, with a median time to progression of 6.7 months. Additionally, the median overall survival was 11.7 months, and the overall response rate was 13%. Beata says that this study is one of the first reports evaluating a population-based value of lapatinib plus capecitabine in clinical practice.