Letter in response to “Our HER2 is same as yours”

Molecular-targeted drugs have increasing promise in the treatment of cancer, and some predictive biomarkers for targeted therapies have been reported (1). Trastuzumab (Herceptin), a monoclonal antibody that specifically targets human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) (2), was first approved as a targeted drug for advanced gastric cancer. The ToGA study (3), as a pivotal trial, was an open-label, international, multicenter, phase III randomized controlled trial that examined the clinical efficacy and safety of first-line trastuzumab with chemotherapy for HER2-positive advanced gastric or gastroesophageal junction cancers. This study showed that a median survival time of 13.8 months for the trastuzumab with chemotherapy arm compared with 11.1 months for the chemotherapy alone arm (P=0.0046). Trastuzumab with chemotherapy improved median survival, time-to-progression and progression-free survival compared with chemotherapy alone. As a result, trastuzumab therapy with chemotherapy has become the standard treatment for HER2-positive advanced gastric cancer patients.