Dr. Vasan on Advancing the Treatment of Small HER2+ Breast Cancer

Neil Vasan, MD, physician-scientist, assistant professor of medicine, Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center, Columbia University Medical Center, discusses advances made in the treatment of patients with small HER2-positive breast cancer.

Despite being a difficult-to-treat disease decades ago, significant advances in the field of HER2-positive breast cancer have transformed the management of the disease, Vasan explains. Particularly with the incorporation of HER2-directed therapies, the curability of HER2-positive breast cancer has risen for patients with moderate amounts of disease, as well as those with small amounts of disease, Vasan says.

Notably, some of these regimens can be de-escalated without compromising efficacy in patients with small HER2-positive breast cancer, including those with tumors less than 2 cm or negative lymph nodes, Vasan says. As such, these options allow treatments to be tailored to a patient’s individual needs, Vasan concludes.