Opinions Welcome

So here's the short of it
I meet the qualification to be in the ALTTO Clinical Trial, or I can choose the standard chemotherapy treatment.


And here's the long

The indications for chemotherapy which are present in my cancer are marked *

Less than 35 years old

*Tumor larger than 1 cm

Lymph Node positive for cancer cells

* Grade 3 cancer

* Proteins expressed (Estrogen Receptor, Progesterone Receptor, Her2/neu

So I have 3 out of 5 and should get chemotherapy.

If I choose the standard chemotherapy it would go something like this, as I understand it right now.

For 6 months I would receive an infusion cocktail of Taxotere, Carboplatin, and Herceptin (Trastuzumab).

Then Herceptin would continue as an infusion for a year.

Herceptin is the drug I raved about in an earlier post as a new weapon against Her2/neu cancers which are a bit nasty...

If I choose the clinical trial ALTTO it would go like this.

ALTTO’s Structure

The ALTTO trial will randomly assign 8,000 people from 50 countries to one of four treatment arms:

• Trastuzumab (this is Herceptin) alone, given intravenously (by IV) once weekly or once every three weeks for 52 weeks.
• Lapatinib alone, given as a pill once daily for 52 weeks.
• Trastuzumab for 12 weeks, followed by a six-week break, followed by lapatinib for 34 weeks.
• Lapatinib and trastuzumab together for 52 weeks.

Some people also will receive paclitaxel (brand name: Taxol) chemotherapy each week during the first 12 weeks.

Before starting the trial, participants will have already completed surgery and chemotherapy with an anthracycline (doxorubicin [brand name: Adriamycin] or epirubicin [brand name: Ellence]). They will be followed for ten years after the start of treatment.

Lapatinib is already FDA approved and being used for HER2-positive advanced (metastatic) breast cancer. So no one gets a placebo in this trial.

I still have lots of reading to do to make this decision.
Anyone who has thoughts about how to make this decision (besides flipping a coin), please speak up!