Medicine

New Drug Doubles Survival Time for Patients with HER2-Mutant Lung Cancer

How the science connects

Clinical trialTargeted therapyCancer treatment

AI Insight

A phase 3 clinical trial (DESTINY-Lung04) demonstrated that first-line treatment with trastuzumab deruxtecan significantly improved progression-free survival in patients with advanced or metastatic HER2-mutant non-small cell lung cancer compared to the standard combination of pembrolizumab plus platinum-based chemotherapy. The results were presented at the 2026 World Conference on Lung Cancer and represent primary findings from this randomized controlled trial.


This finding could establish a new first-line treatment standard for HER2-mutant NSCLC, a specific molecular subtype of lung cancer. The targeted therapy approach may offer better outcomes than current chemotherapy-immunotherapy combinations for this patient population, potentially changing clinical practice guidelines.


First-line treatment with trastuzumab deruxtecan (T-DXd) significantly improved progression-free survival compared with pembrolizumab plus platinum-based chemotherapy in patients with advanced or metastatic HER2-mutant non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), according to primary results from the phase 3 DESTINY-Lung04 trial presented at the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer (IASLC) 2026 World Conference on Lung Cancer (WCLC).

Source: First-line trastuzumab deruxtecan significantly improves progression-free survival in HER2-mutant lung cancer