Breast cancer cure news: Study reveals cheaper breast cancer drug to be equally effective as Herceptin

Charmaine Montes Wednesday, June 08, 2016

Treating breast cancer has never been easy especially in the financial part. Drugs used to battle cancer are expensive, which is why many breast cancer patients are not able to acquire or benefit from them. Fortunately, a new study reveals that a cheaper drug is available and it's as effective as the standard drug Herceptin (trastuzumab).

Cheaper breast cancer drugs are effective, study finds. | Pixabay

According to a report by WebMD, a clinical trial for the biosimilar trastuzumab antibody drug MYL-1401O has found it to be equally effective in treating patients with HER2-positive breast cancer. Even though it's cheaper in price, it works well in mimicking Herceptin and targets aggressive breast cancer tumors.

It has been detailed that Mylan Pharmaceuticals was the one who sponsored the study on the cheaper alternative to breast cancer drug. The research was then presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology where it claimed that the study turned out to be a success.

It's actually still at the preliminary stages but Dr. Hope Rugo, the leader of the clinical trial and professor of medicine at the University of California San Francisco, said that they are hoping that the introduction of the biosimilar drug will allow people to easily access effective drugs.

As BABW News reported, the research involved the participation of 500 women who were then separated into two groups. Both groups received chemotherapy with either Herceptin or the MYL-1401O trastuzumab antibody drug. The duration of giving both regimens lasted for eight cycles. Afterwards, the researchers cut MYL-1401O trastuzumab and administered Herceptin alone until the disease progressed.

Six months later, results were garnered and it was found out that both groups showed similar outcome. There was a 64 percent response rate for Herceptin and 70 percent for MYL-1401O. It also delivered the same results for the serious side effects. It was 36 percent with Herceptin and 38 percent for the biosimilar drug.

It basically showed that the cheaper drug can be utilized soon, which means that patients who lack finances will be able to easily access treatment for breast cancer.