Hi everyone. I would like to tap into your knowledge and wise opinions if you don’t mind. Some of you might of seen me on the forum before and know I am very lucky enough to do quite well. My question is that after my recent check up with the nurse practitioner we got into conversation and she said that it was good that I had a complete response to my initial treatment nearly 2 years ago ( docetaxol/perjeta/herceptin) as it has shown that I respond well to treatment or that they found the right treatment quickly. I only see my onc once a year for scan results or if I request to see him and on my last visit he also said the same a complete response is good and that i continue to respond to perjeta and herceptin with tamoxifen is also good news. Apart from my 3 weekly infusion and 3 monthly blood tests they pretty much treat me like a primary patient and leave me alone. I know this is all good news and I am very aware of my circumstances and how lucky I am but I’m not sure if I should believe them when they say that a complete response is good news for long term survival. I do try to research this but all the medical terminology can be a little confusing. Is there anyone out there that can give me the benifit of their knowledge. Thanks in advance.
Hi elliedog, good to see you posting.
I too have been lucky enough to respond well to the treatments I have had since being diagnosed with SBC in 2008. The only time i didn’t get the response I had wanted was on docetaxel (plus H and P) however it did work to a lesser extent and touch wood the H and P are still working well and my liver mets have been continuing to shrink. It seems that although we all might be classed by our receptor status as to the type of BC we have it’s not know how our own BC will respond. Take the case of our lovely Bev and Helen, unfortunately for them their cancers were incredibly resistant to chemotherapy and having been a member of the forum since 2008 I have seen this on many an occasion. So I’d say your oncologist is correct and the longer you respond to each treatment the better the outlook, after all if each response is measured in months or years rather than weeks and months that has to be a good thing. What none of us knows is how our own cancer adapts to the treatments and after time becomes resistant to them. THere is a great informative book called The Emperor of All Maladies which is about the history and science of cancer if you want to understand a bit more about how cancers adapt and how they come about in the first instance, after all they are only a mutation of our own cells not a disease in its own right that we catch.
Hope the H and P combo keeps working for you and your visits to your oncologist stay the frequency that they are!
Nicky x
Hi elliedog/Ncky,
So gald your treatments seem to be working well for you. How i wish they could fnd something for me!!
I was misdiagnosed for 5 months wth sknmets so ddnt get any treatnment for 6 months and 'm convnced ths has made thngs a whole lot worse. Was giiven docetaxol and capectabine and told was in remisson…ths was after a pet scan but no biopses, which turns out is the only way to test skn mets. Wthin 2 weeks of being told this (6 weeks after treatment stopped) the mets were back and spreadng. 'm now on eribuln but 'm sure ts not working as have further spread…seems no one s really sure how to montor. Not only do seem to be chemo resistant, none of the hormone therapies have worked so far , although dd have 2 ‘free’ years on aromasin. 'm now very scared because as you say the qucker the treatments fail, the quicker you get to the end of the list.
I try to stay positve but ts not always easy is it? thanks for lstening. x