Chris, you asked about my trial

nancys

I am part of a trial called the NSABP B-31. It is a trial for early stage breast cancer patients who are node positive & over express the Her-2/neu. It is largly to see if the chemo drug Herceptin will benefit the early stage cancers, like mine. The group was randomized into 2 groups. One group gets the standard treatment of 4 cycles of A/C and 4 cycles of Taxol and radiation. Tamoxifen for 5 years. My Tamoxifen started with my first chemo treatment. The other group gets this same drug plan and added Herceptin. The Herceptin is given weekly for one year and begins with the first Taxol infusion. I fell into the group that received standard treatment with no Herceptin. Still, I have the MUGGA scans like the other group to check for heart damage. The MUGGA is done at 3,6,9,&18 months. The trial pays for these tests and my hospital charges 1300.00 per MUGGA. This trial wants to track me for the rest of my life to see what results the chemo had for me. Herceptin is VERY expensive and my HMO will not pay for it unless there is a recurrance. Pray I do not ever need it!!! But my Onco told me that he would give it to every patient if it were affordable because he believes in it so strongly. Thats the trial information. I also took part in the sentinel node biopsy trial and got the standard treatment with both the sentinel node and the axillary dissection...Lucky me...but as it turned out, I was lucky because I did have one positive node-the sentinel node was positive and they had to look for more, anyway. Seems like so long ago, now, and yet this is only 2 years. Thanks for the exercise boost...I needed someone to suggest the benefit to get me started. Love to you, Nancy