Update on my mother
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Hi Lainey.
They haven’t done any blood cultures yet. She has an appt tomorrow for chemo, and they usually do lab work there. Once I get there, I will let the doctor know about her conditons of getting these high fevers.
She was on levaquin before but they took it off her because they said her body will get immune to it. I do believe that her not being on it is giving her the fevers. The doctor did not say the fevers were caused by the chemo, but said it’s caused by the cancer…Thank you, I will ask the doctor tomorrow!
jUJUBEAR, I am so very sorry this is still going on. Just wanted to ask if they did a blood culture for infection? Teddy used to get blood infections from the CC and the ONLY way to detect one is with a blood culture. Since the culture would take 4 – 5 days they would start him on Levaquin immediately as the Onc said Levaquin will kill anything going on that should not be. He would get chills and fevers around 103. I would put 3 blankets/quilts on him and climb on top and he still could not warm up. Called an ambulance each time and as soon as they started a Levaquin IV he would loose the fever and the chills. Does the ONC feel the fever and chills are from the chemo?
Hello all.
Thank you for giving me advice for my mother.
After a week in the hospital, she was released. In the hospital she could not get out of bed and was very weak. The first few days, they had her with lasix and spirililatin (?) by IV, then switched her over to the pills. I saw that her belly looked a lot better after the IV, and asked the doctors why they had switched. They said because the IV meds are too strong and she needs to get the pills when she gets home.
Being home now, her belly looks very full again. She has a fever almost everyday. She did well for her first chemo of FU. I also bought the biotin ( thanks LAURA) and she likes that it helps her with her dry mouth.
She has compression socks, and it seems to keep her warm. Did I mention thT she feels cold all the time. And once she feels a little chill, she tends to get a fever.
Before going home, we were given a walker with 2 wheels to help her walk. I want to ask the doctors tomorrow if we can get a wheelchair for when we go to the hospital. Being that we travel 2 hrs to get the hospital for treatment, once she gets there she is too weak to walk to the treatment center.
Before I forget, while staying in the hospital, the doctos wanted to take out the fluid in my mothers belly with a needle. But my mother refused because she was scared of infection. She also got red blood transferred because she was very low.
Thank you for taking your time to read this long update. Keep on fighting!
Hi, Jujubear
I think your mom should be taking care in the hospital. I will tell you why.
My husband has the same problem, Lasix didn’t work. Taking oral treatment for fluid developing doesn’t work. Medicine taken in perfusion form work directely, but Lasix seems to not work for any pacients that i met here, in Leuven – Belgium Universitary Hospital. Now, the professor of my husband, is giving to him Burinex – perfusion. It is working very good. I forgot to tell you that in the case of my husband a stent it is not possible to be implemented, it is to risky.So, maybe this information will help you.
God bless you,
Liliana, Belgium
Hi friends. Today was supposed to be my mother’s first day of 5fu but we had to bring her into the emergency room because her stomach was giving her pain and she almost fell while using the restroom.
The doctors drew out some fluid in her stomach to test for infection. No word yet, but we are hoping everything will be ok. My mother seems to feel at ease being here, so that is good. Will update you all later. Thanks.My mom just finished her third round of F5U combined with oxiliplatin. She does great while the pump is connected. After the disconnect, the next 2days are tough in her. Extreme fatigue and nausea. The nausea is relieved by meds. My mom rinses with Biotin 2x a day to help avoid mouth sores. She drinks water with electrolytes to reduce the chance of dehydration. I let her sleep a lot during those days and she makes up her nutrition in the following week.
Good luck,
LaurenJujubear I can’t offer any sage advise as Teddy never had chemo. I do want to say how much I admire your Mother for her strength and attitude. I know others will tap in here and lend some light to your questions. I know you will keep us posted as well.
Jujubear…I am in awe of your Mom. She is determined to fight this disease and is exploring all available options. I am positive that others will come forward and share their thoughts with you however; in the meantime you might want to use the “search” function by entering the word “ascities.” We have numerous postings addressing the common occurrence of fluid retention and I am positive that you will find some answers here also.
Hopefully others will chime in real soon.
Hugs,
MarionHello. I wanted to give you an update on my mother, and welcome any advice/comments! My mother was diagnosed with bile duct cancer in Feb of 2012. She started her treatment of chemo gemzar in the last week of march 2012 until the end of august 2012. She got her CT scan done in the last week Aug 2012. At her follow up with the Dr, he let us know that the gemzar looked to working at shrinking her tumor in the beginning 2 months, then it looks to not work at shrinking it towards the months to follow. He gave us 3 choices and recommended one of them.
The first is to combine gemzar with cisplan. He does not recommend this because my mother is not in her stronger state and he says it takes a lot out of the older patients, leaving them bedridden.The second choice was to try 5FU, which he recommended. He did tell us that it is an older form, but they do show that it works it some patients to fight this cancer. Side affects were similar to gemzar, with added sore mouth and may cause diarrhea.
The third was to stop treatment all together. For my mother, this was not an option, so it wasn’t discussed further! She is a fighter, for sure!
Back in June 2012, she took a trip to Korea to meet with a well known doctor who performed laser surgery to patients with bile duct cancer. After doing tests and scans and also looking her chart, he was unable to do the procedure on her because of her tumor location. Her tumor is located by where all her blood vessels are and all the doctors have said that it’s in a bad spot…
After returning, she developed a bloated abdomen, and swollen feet. The Dr prescribed her a diuretic spiiralltic ( sorry for the wrong spelling) and it worked after 2 weeks. But after her meds were finished her salt levels went down, and they said that she will not be given that anymore.
After about two weeks ( which is now) she developed the same bloated abdomen and swollen feet. The dr prescribed lasix of 1/2 pill ( 10 mg). After about 3 days, we saw that she was looking worse, so I contacted the dr and he said to increase the dose to another 1/2 pill. Saturday will be one week of taking the prescription, but no signs of her getting relief. Anyone know how long it usually take for it to work?
Also, tomorrow she is supposed to start her first treatment of 5FU, but she is not sure she can even make it there… Any advice is much appreciated. Thanks.
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