Dr. Geyer Discusses Pertuzumab in HER2+ Breast Cancer

Charles E. Geyer, Jr, MD, professor of medicine, Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine; associate director for clinical research and Harrigan, Haw, Luck Families chair in Cancer Research, Massey Cancer Center, discusses the use of pertuzumab (Perjeta) in HER2-positive breast cancer.

Pertuzumab has established itself as an important addition to the treatment landscape for HER2-positive disease, Geyer says, due in large part to the results of the CLEOPATRA study which focused on the metastatic setting. HER2-targeted antibodies were developed as a way to engage the immune system, but their mechanism of action was not clearly seen until this pivotal trial. Geyer notes that if researchers are seeing such stringent responses in the metastatic setting, then pertuzumab should also have a role in early breast cancer.

In addition to prolonged survival, pertuzumab has been shown to increase pathologic complete response rate, although there has been some skepticism associated with the APHINITY trial. Geyer says that it is important to note that the patient subsets in this study were of a higher-risk disease. The patients who seemed to have the best outcomes were the ones treated with dual antibodies.