Patient and Healthcare Professional Experience with Fixed-Dose Subcutaneous Pertuzumab and Trastuzumab (PHESGO) in a High-Volume Oncology Center in Vietnam: A Real-World Study from a Resource-Constrained Setting

Breast cancer remains one of the most common health challenges for women worldwide, and for a specific group of patients, the disease is driven by a protein on the surface of their cells called HER2. When this protein is present in high amounts, it signals the cancer to grow aggressively. For decades, doctors have treated this type of cancer with powerful drugs that target the HER2 protein, but these medicines traditionally required a long, slow drip into a vein, often taking several hours to complete. This process ties up hospital chairs and staff, and it demands that patients spend a significant portion of their day in a clinic, which can be exhausting and logistically difficult, especially for those who travel far from home.

In recent years, scientists developed a way to deliver these same life-saving drugs through a quick injection under the skin, a method that takes only minutes. This shift from a slow drip to a fast shot promises to change the daily rhythm of cancer treatment, but it also raises a practical question: does this new method work just as well for patients and doctors in busy hospitals, particularly in countries where medical resources are stretched thin? To answer this, researchers at the largest cancer hospital in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, set out to observe how real patients and medical staff experienced this faster treatment in their daily routine.

The study focused on forty-five women receiving treatment for HER2-positive breast cancer at the Ho Chi Minh City Oncology Hospital. These patients had already received at least three rounds of the new subcutaneous injection, which combines two drugs, pertuzumab and trastuzumab, into a single shot. The researchers asked these women to fill out detailed questionnaires about their experience, comparing the new method to the older, longer intravenous drips they might have used before. At the same time, the nurses who administered the shots and managed the clinic workflow completed their own surveys, tracking how long each step took and how the new process felt to them. The goal was not to test if the drugs worked medically—previous large trials had already confirmed they were effective—but to understand the human and operational side of switching to this faster approach in a high-volume setting.

The results painted a clear picture of a treatment that was widely embraced. When asked about their overall experience, more than four out of five patients expressed high satisfaction with the new injection method. Nearly eight out of ten patients said they preferred this quick shot over the traditional slow drip. As the women received more treatments, their preference for the new method grew stronger; by the third time they were surveyed, over ninety percent said they favored the injection. The primary reasons for this shift were time and convenience. Patients reported that the new method was significantly easier to continue with their daily lives, with almost ninety percent saying it was less burdensome than the old way. The injection itself was generally painless, and when discomfort did occur, it was mild and far less than the discomfort associated with finding a vein for an intravenous line.

For the healthcare professionals, the benefits were equally striking, though they focused on the flow of the hospital day. The nurses reported that the entire process of preparing and giving the subcutaneous injection took an estimated median of just thirteen minutes. In stark contrast, the traditional intravenous method required a median of seventy-five minutes to complete the same task. This massive reduction in time meant that the clinic could see more patients without needing more staff or more chairs. The nurses expressed high confidence in the reliability of the new injection and found it easy to use, with nearly ninety percent rating the process as straightforward. They also noted that the new method used fewer resources overall, which is a critical advantage in a busy hospital where every minute counts.

While the experience was overwhelmingly positive, the researchers did find one specific factor that could lower a patient's satisfaction: pain at the injection site. Patients who reported feeling pain or discomfort where the shot was given were significantly less likely to rate the treatment highly. However, the study noted that this pain was generally very mild and did not outweigh the major advantages of saving time and reducing the burden of a long hospital visit. The data suggested that with proper care and perhaps some extra attention to how the shot is given, this minor hurdle could be managed effectively.

The study concluded that this faster, under-the-skin treatment is not only medically sound but also highly acceptable to both patients and doctors in a resource-constrained environment. By cutting the treatment time from over an hour to just a few minutes, the new method eases the pressure on hospital staff and gives patients back their time. For the women in Vietnam who participated, the change meant less time waiting in a clinic and more time with their families, proving that a small change in how a drug is delivered can have a large impact on the quality of life during cancer treatment.