Share
HER2 Prognosis and Survival
In patients with early-stage disease, HER2 is correlated with shorter disease-free survival in breast cancer
These Kaplan-Meier curves show the relationship between HER2 amplification and disease-free survival in node-negative (top) and node-positive (bottom) patients. In both cases, HER2 amplification, defined as having 3 or more copies of the HER2 gene, was significantly correlated with shorter disease-free survival (P=0.009, node-negative patients; P=0.001, node-positive patients).11 Modified with permission from J Clin Oncol vol. 11(10), 1993:1936-1942.
HER2 is a negative prognostic factor
In both breast and ovarian cancers, HER2 is associated with shorter disease-free and overall survival.
- In breast cancer
- A landmark 1987 study by Slamon et al (N=189) showed a highly statistically significant correlation between HER2 gene amplification and shorter time to disease relapse (P<0.0001) as well as shorter overall survival (P=0.0011)12
- In a 1993 study of patients with stage I-III disease (N=1056), 3-fold or greater gene amplification of HER2 was associated with significantly shorter disease-free survival (risk ratio=1.95, P=0.0027)11
- HER2 gene amplification was also significantly associated with pathologic stage at diagnosis, axillary node involvement, and histologic subtype
- In an additional study of 580 node-negative patients, HER2 overexpression was associated with higher risk of disease recurrence (risk ratio=2.36, P=0.002)13
- In ovarian cancer
- HER2 positivity levels, as measured by FISH and IHC, have been associated with decreased overall survival in numerous clinical studies14
- HER2 positivity levels are also associated with an increase in relative risk of death caused by ovarian cancer14