davidh
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Charlotte,
As other members said, I’m sorry you had to join this club but it definitely consists of some of the finest people you will ever deal with. And as Darla said above, what chemos or treatment regimens work for one person do not work for another. But I will tell you my wife’s story because the oncologist who gave her a chemo regimen that worked beautifully for her for 8 months is in Texas as you are.
My wife was diagnosed Jan. 1, 2006 and despite her outstanding physical condition the prognosis was poor. This included a prognosis from of the major cancer centers in the nation.
We were led to Dr. Carlos Bacerra at U.S. Oncology at the Sammons Cancer Center of Baylor Medical Center in Dallas. He is a gastrointestinal cancer specialist and recommended chemo with Gemzar and Oxaliplatin which was administered by one of our local cancer centers in Albuquerque. It worked wonderfully for 8 months, shrinking the tumors and making her a candidate for surgery. By the time we could have more specialized CT scans made and sent off to two out of state doctors that we were considering to do the surgery, the cancer adapted to the chemo and began growing again. Surgery could not then be performed and we were not able to stop the advance of the cancer. I lost her in November of 2007.
If you want to consider contacting Dr. Bacerra, the phone number is 214-370-1001 and the email address is http://www.SammonsCancerCtr.com
I also know of people with great things to say about M.D. Anderson as well.
Considerations such as your location and insurance are things you will be looking at as well.
I hope the very best for your husband and may God Bless Both of You.
Sincerely,
DavidhRobyn,
I’m very sorry to hear of your husband’s diagnosis. I am not familiar with treatment of such large tumors, but maybe can give a little general information.
My wife was diagnosed Jan.1, 2006 with CC plus a tumor in the liver about 7 Cm.
She was on Gemzar plus Oxaliplatin for 10 months, and the tumor shrank to only 2.3 Cm 6 months after treatment started and was about the same 2 months later. She was being considered for resection of both it and the bile duct tumor, when suddenly the tumor began growing again very fast up to 8.5 Cm in Feb. 2007, ending chance of resection. I mention this only because this particular chemo combination worked very well for her with virtually no side effects during that time, although most people have a bad time with the oxaliplatin.
The next consideration was ChemoEmboliztion, and I noticed several postings about it under “Experiences”. I don’t know the maximum size tumor that can be treated with this method, but it didn’t work for my wife because the doctors could not find any arteries feeding the tumor to inject the chemo into!
The tumor is now up to over 10 Cm, another Chemo was tried starting in June (Taxol and Carboplatin), but it beat her to the ground, caused considerable pain, and she had to be hospitalized on Sunday the 15th with infection due to extremely low white blood counts. She is out now, very weak, but recovering, and will not receive that chemo again! The next step is not sure, but except for the last 6 weeks, has felt good and enjoyed every day. Of course we pray a lot and are looking at supplements that may help.
We will be praying for you and your husband, as we do for others on the website. Above all, keep asking questions and checking all the alternatives. May God Bless You Both.Kris,
Thank you so much for the reply and information. When we saw our Oncologist after the inability to do ChemoEmboliztion on my wife, we did learn that the metastasis in her liver had much slowed its rapid growth that occurred from late November 2006 to February 2007, now increasing only 10% from Feb. to April. Since she was feeling so good, we asked if he thought not starting chemo again could wait a few weeks, and he said YES! So we got ready and took our first real vacation in nearly 4 years, 3 weeks by car from the Southwest to the Oregon Coast and Seattle area! I felt this would do her as much good- and maybe more – than starting chemo again immediately, and I think it did! Praise the Lord! She did great on the trip, no problems, and we had a wonderful time.
She had a CT Scan on May 24th, the results of which we will learn at her doctors visit on June 1. Then, depending on the results, she may be on the Taxol & Carboplatin, (but not Xeloda) which she is much dreading, although she did great on Gemzar & Oxaliplatin with very few side effects. Therefore, your husband’s experience helps very much and I am anxious to tell her. Naturally, all of us going through this know that response and side effects are very individual, but your response gives us much hope!
Incidentally, is your husband on a particular diet or supplements? We have moved my wife to more natural foods, even though she always preferred vegetables & fruits, and have her on Milk Thistle with plans to add more supplements. Our Oncologist is not much of a believer in this, but I’m hoping I can convince him to go along.
May the Lord be with both of you. You will truly be in our prayers.
DavidJerryD,
Thank you so much for your reply and info. We will likely be discussing this with our Oncologist on Monday as well as other possible chemo and any other options. Of course we hope to find someone who had experienced it and would know the ups & downs of that treatment. Believe me we are keeping up hope. My wife has decided from the first that she will beat this and has done great so far. Our best to you and you will be in our prayers.Kris,
I am so sorry to hear your husband’s report. We were very shocked recently to get the latest scan for my wife who did great on chemo (See A Shock for Us..just above your posting). A couple of things from her experience – She was given Kytril for nausea which I believe works chemically similar to Zofran, but I believe it’s very expensive if your insurance won’t cover it. Also, she had been given Reglan in the hospital which worked well for her also. The great thing is that Reglan works differently than Zofran or Kytril, and can be taken in between doses of those drugs, and is inexpensive. Check with your doctor on that. Also, my wife didn’t have any actual vomiting, just felt nauseated and didn’t want to eat. We discovered some of this may have been due to a bit of dehydration, because she didn’t want to drink either. Then, after 4 months of chemo, a Nurse suggested drinking as much Gatorade as possible. She found she could drink that without feeling nauseated, began drinking about 64oz per day, and completely ended her “down days” after chemo when she was in bed totally exhausted for days 2, 3, & 4 after chemo! This may not help your husband (it didn’t help a fellow patient w/leukemia at our cancer center) but it’s worth knowing about. God Bless You & Your Family, and our best to you all.Peter and others,
My wife was on Gemzar & Oxaliplatin every 2 weeks from March 20, 2006 through Jan. 10, 2007 except for one treatment cancelled because of stent replacement. She had great success on a metastasis in her liver, going from nearly 7 by 7 Cm to 2.3 Cm in 6 months, and was lucky to have very few side effects. She is presently being considered for surgery.
I know this is not your regimen, but wanted to tell you that on her Oxaliplatin infusion day, in addition to anti-emetic and steroid pre-meds, she was given Magnesium & Calcium infused for 1 hour prior to the 2 hour Oxaliplatin infusion, followed by another hour infusion of Magnesium & Calcium. We were given this regimen by our advisory Oncologist in Dallas, whereas our local treatment center does not usually follow the Oxaliplatin with the second Mg & Ca infusion. Whether this helped her side effects or she just had a high natural tolerance, I don’t know, but thought I would pass it along to you and any others on Oxaliplatin.
Our prayers for you all.Thank you all for your replies, and again my apologies for the slow response.
Mary, we honestly do not know yet what will be attempted, but hope the tumor on the bile duct can be removed. Our Oncologist and our GI doctor can not see this area clearly enough to give good information, and the two doctors we have contacted have each said that scans on an advanced 3-D CT Scanner at their facilities would have to be done for them to give an answer. The catch is that insurance requires us to make a choice of the doctor we want to go to up front, so we are trying to collect all the info we can. Also, our oncologist and one of the doctors both feel that if both the metastasis and the bile duct tumors can’t be removed, then it is a wasted effort. Our advising Oncologist in Dallas does not agree, saying that statistics show removal of even the metastasis improves her chances. When we were first trying to learn all the options last year, we did send an MRI to a surgeon who used to be with the Johns Hopkins bile duct team, but from that early view he said he couldn’t operate on the bile duct tumor because it involved the Portal Vein, although he did have hope for the metastasis if it could be reduced (which it now is). This is why we are looking for the best surgeon with experience resecting the ducts and even the Portal vein if possible.Lainy, thanks very much for your info as well. Mary referred also to the Whipple procedure, which was never mentioned in my wife’s case. I also believe it may be because it is restricted more to tumors on the lower duct, but am not sure and would like to be corrected if I am wrong.
Sara, thanks for the info on the Hewlett site. I will defintely check that out to learn what we may expect.
Again, my thanks to you all, and our prayers to you and your loved ones.
Marions – My wife, who has both a Klatzins tumor and a metastasis in her liver, has been recommended for surgery after 10 months of chemo successfully reduced the metastasis to almost one-third its original size. I would like very much to e-mail directly to you to ask some specific information and advice about surgeons, but have not put her profile and an e-mail address on site because we presently have to use our daughter’s computer and she heavily uses it for work. Is there a way Stacie could act as a go-between to privately give you the EMail address that I provided to log in so that we could have a few exchanges? In this way my daughter wouldn’ t have to worry about unexpected EMails. Hopefully, we will have a computer soon. Thank you so much, and our prayers and best wishes for your husband and you.
