Subcutaneous Herceptin trial reveals benefits for Breast Cancer patients

Women with HER2-positive early Breast Cancer treated with a new, investigational subcutaneous (SC) injection of Herceptin (trastuzumab), from Roche, experienced comparable results to those given Herceptin as an intravenous (IV) infusion, according to new results from a Phase III study. According to results of the HannaH trial involving 596 women, the SC administration takes around 5 minutes to administer whereas the standard IV formulation takes around 30 minutes to infuse. Since the subcutaneous administration is an injection under the skin it may allow patients to spend less time in hospital receiving their treatment versus the intravenous method. The ready-to-use formulation may also significantly reduce pharmacy time as no medicine preparation time is required. No new safety signals were observed and adverse events were overall consistent with Herceptin IV. Herceptin SC uses Enhanze Technology, developed by Halozyme which enables the injection of large volumes of a medication under the skin. Roche also has additional ongoing trials of a subcutaneous formulation of MabThera (rituximab) for patients with Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma and Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia.