Verzenio now possibly to be given to women with earlier stages of breast cancer

[kearnan]

I am now on Verzenio for stage iv. Twice a day (Ibrance did not work). I now read an article on survivor.net about them finding that it may work for women with early stage breast cancer to prevent a recurrence. I was not sure how to take this article since I was prescribed it for stage iv and how do you prevent a reoccurence of stage iv which they say it is incurable to begin with. See below (copied and pasted):

"Advances In Treatment: What’s New?

For women with early-stage breast cancer, an encouraging new study found that the new drug, Verzenio, a CDK4/CDK6 inhibitor, helps slow down cancer in women with HR+, HER2- metastatic breast cancer and helps prevent a recurrence.

(Me: How can it prevent a recurrence if you are already stage iv?)

Dr. Elizabeth Comen explains how CDK4/CDK6 inhibitors help fight metastatic breast cancer

“This is an important study because it showed that women with early breast cancer who are at significantly high risk for metastasis had a benefit, meaning improvement in invasive disease-free survival,” says Dr. Elizabeth Comen, a medical oncologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. “We are always looking for ways to improve outcomes for early-stage breast cancer patients and it means that we may be adding Verzenio to our arsenal.”

That is great news for those women who are diagnosed with early breast cancer to take a medication that is now given to those with stage iv and it may stop the ladies with the early breast cancer from their cancer spreading or coming back. That is a big step forward if they can start using Verzenio to prevent women from ever becoming a stage iv cancer patient.

[illini9]

HI, It could have been written clearer I think but they are saying that if given to people early stage patients with HER2+ it could prevent recurrence or metastasis. Drugs are often used in the stage IV/MBC arena and then tested on early stage and moved up if found to be helpful. It doesn't happen in reverse often. So you are already benefitting from Verzenio as a new treatment and this article is saying StageI-III may also benefit.

[Red71]

That’s what I understand also. They think that if they give it to women having their first bout of breast cancer who they think are likely to go on to have metastatic disease, it might prevent that. In my case, if I was having my first bout I probably would not be offered it because they did not think I was at risk for a reoccurrence.