Changes (mutations) in the HER2 gene are found in about 2 percent of non-small cell lung cancers, which make up nearly 85 percent of all lung cancers. Medical oncologists, including Kwok-Kin Wong, MD, PhD, and Joshua K. Sabari, MD, at NYU Langone Health’s Perlmutter Cancer Center, are studying ways to treat people with non-small cell lung cancer by using drugs that target HER2 mutations.

Dr. Sabari, assistant professor in the Department of Medicine at NYU Grossman School of Medicine, is one of several Perlmutter Cancer Center researchers investigating a drug called poziotinib for people with HER2-positive non-small cell lung cancer.

“This is a very complicated field,” says Dr. Wong, the Anne Murnick Cogan and David H. Cogan Professor of Oncology in the Department of Medicine and director of the Division of Hematology and Medical Oncology at Perlmutter Cancer Center. “Even though we say HER2 mutated, the type of mutation in HER2 makes a difference. It’s the ultimate precision medicine. The type of mutation of that gene dictates how well it would respond to certain drugs.”

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