A new and experimental breast cancer drug called lapatinib inhibited tumor growth in nearly half of women who took it for eight weeks in a national Phase I clinical trial, according to results of a study being presented at the annual American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting in New Orleans. Kimberly Blackwell, M.D., an oncologist from the Duke Comprehensive Cancer Center, presented data showing that 46 percent of breast cancer patients who took the oral drug for eight weeks had stable disease or tumor shrinkage. Approximately 24 percent of patients who took the drug for four months had stable disease or tumor shrinkage.
