Physorg.com -- August 19, 2010 An Article published Online First by The Lancet says that for patients with HER2-positive advanced gastric cancer, addition of tastuzumab to standard cisplatinum/fluoropyrimidine chemotherapy results in a median survival of 13.8 months, compared with 11.1 months with chemotherapy alone. This corresponds to a 26% reduction in the death rate for patients in the trastuzumab group. Thus trastuzumab combined with standard chemotherapy could be considered a new standard option for patients with this condition. However, an accompanying Comment questions the cost effectiveness of the treatment. The Article is by Professor Yung-Jue Bang, Seoul National University College of Medicine, Seoul, South Korea, and Dr Eric van Custem, University Hospital Gathuisberg, Leuven, Belgium, and colleagues.
