Hi I’ve been taking Ibandronic acid for 5 months now and have to take them for 3 years - no side effects. I get side effects from Letrozole but they are manageable. Ask for a bone scan if they don’t offer you one. Facts always help you make the right decision. I want everything that can give me more quality of life. I am 75. Best of luck.
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After being diagnosed in Dec 2023 with breast cancer Stage 4 in my back bones, femar and lungs I have been on letrozole…no serious issues taking this drug. Plus I had zometa…at first monthly for 6 months and now once every 3 months… no serious ill effects.
Visited the dentist before I started on zolendronic acid and had him check me out a year later to ensure no change in my jaws.
Failed to take the traget drug Kisqali as it caused near liver failure and I collapsed a few times…so saw quite a bit of A&E for 3 months!
I take Adcal tablets vit D and Calcium as I was osteopenia before I was even diagnosed as stage 4. I was having bone density scans before my latest diagnosis.
A bone density scan may or may not help your understanding but I think, if you have the resources, you can pay for one privately.
I did have a lot of hair thining ( fell out every time I touched my head) . I just went and had my hair cut really short. Through a blood test discovered it was a lack of folate and a month of taking the tablets stopped that. Friends were great they all knitted me hats in case I needed them…which I donated to the Cancer charities for others suffering hair loss. So far about 30 hats donated. So from a negative for me came a positive…other people suffering hair loss can benefit and friends enjoy knitting for charity.
Historically in 1996 I had stage 2 breast cancer Estrogen positive. A lumpectomy. On Tamoxifen for 5 years…yepp like others side efects ( so bad consultants had to take sudden medication action…but I can’t recall what it was) but kept going with the Tamoxifen drugs. Had several weeks off work initially due to the sleep deprivation caused by Tamoxifen but it sorted itself out and I returned to FT work.
I feel lucky that my treatment kept off cancer for all those years. It included ablation of my ovaries…not common these days as I was pre-menopausal and plunged me within weeks into sudden menopause.
Latest diagnoses was, as I mentioned above, Dec 2023. Medical profession thought I had deteriorating arthritis!
Every one has to make their own choices of opting in and out of treatment. It’s good to hear though that for some people some of the drugs have no serious side effects and helps their survival rates.
We all tolerate side effects to different degrees and it’s diffcult for the medical profession to judge at the outset.
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Hi jayesse
Just reporting back that NM bone scan indicated “nothing of concern”. No other details.
It’s a win … as long as recent reports of scan results being rushed / poorly examined due to pressure of shortage of radiologists hasn’t come into play 
Thanks for your interest 
So glad to hear that. Great news.
I have decided not to have AIs in any form.
I had long meeting with my oncologist and she has been very supportive. I feel so much happier now I have made that decision. I am still having phesgo but that will stop in July.
In the meantime I have developed terrible tinnitus which oncologist says is often caused by carboplatin - so now that’s my ears, eyes and teeth all affected by the chemo! My husband joked it’ll be ok because when my teeth fall out I won’t be able to see in the mirror and the tinnitus will drown out the sound of people talking about me! Honestly this treatment really is the “gift that keeps on giving”. That’s not to mention the cost of buying in shed loads of loo roll to cope with the ongoing diarrhoea!
Hi
Sorry you’re having all these issues at the moment. As if the diagnosis of cancer alone isn’t enough to deal with, eh? I really hope that, once your body’s left to manage itself again, all these things will settle down. I’m having a dental nightmare myself at the moment with 2 adjacent teeth failing (even though I’ve looked after them religiously all my life - blame my childhood dentist who took it upon himself to drill and fill them all with metal - unnecessarily, as I found out later in life ). One is looking like it will have to result in an extraction with all the fear of jaw bone necrosis that comes with that !
(I should correct my previous comment … my dentist explained it is NOT infection in the bone that is the danger; it is the inability for the bone cell regeneration to happen quickly enough - due to the long-term slowing of this process caused by bisphosphonates - to repair any bone damage/injury before it dies off.)
Your hubby sounds like mine. You need someone with that ‘gallows’ sense of humour in times such as these. Sounds like the 4 of us would get along like a house on fire. Not in Sussex UK are you?
I’m glad you have an oncologist who’s been supportive in your decision. Wish I’d had a bit more sympathy and understanding from mine. 
for both of us. x
We were in Sussex until October 22. Now in the west country. Where are you?
Ha you must have had the same childhood dentist as me! I think he’d filled every tooth before I left school…much to the cost of the NHS.
I go for my first zoledronic infusion tomorrow. My teeth worry me. I have a loose tooth, it’s been that way for several years with no other issues, and dentist says it will be ok and very rare for complications. So I take that, and that it could help reduce the possibility of spread to the bone or osteoporosis. And hope all those experts have got it right.
I also found out yesterday, my mum who had Brest cancer 30 years ago had a very similar path. She had tamoxifen, Calcichew and zoledronic (tablet form). She didn’t like the Calcichew so stopped taking them immediately. 30 years on, she is generally very well but does have osteoporosis now. Not taking the Calcichew may have contributed, or it could be simply a case of age catching up. Who knows. She’s got teeth as bad as mine, and not experienced problems. She’s not had a recurrence, and that’s what matters.
Good luck to all those that take the leap and hope it is beneficial and not problematic x
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Worthing. Been trying for quite a few years (on and off) to find the perfect solution for a move to somewhere rural but having to consider several counties northwards to get decent bang for our buck. We were looking around Weymouth / Portland for a while. Parents (now gone, sadly) retired to a village near Blandford Forum. We decided Devon and Cornwall were a bit too far West.
I was born in Shoreham. My sisters live in Shoreham and goring. My husband is a Brighton boy. We are in Somerset now. Don’t miss Sussex at all. Xx
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Hi all. BC 2 diagnosed March 2022. Lobular and triple positive, exactly the same as BC 1 in 2006. I had infusion 5/6 a couple of weeks ago and am now experiencing more joint/bone pain in addition to existing Spinal Stenosis.
Re Dexa scans- I had them first time around when I was perimenopausal and had Osteopenia. Had tablet bisophosphonates until stomach was screaming and was taken off them. Infusions this time and I asked why I wasn’t having a scan. The cheery response was that after Taxotere and Kadcyla and being on an AI, they assume that you have bone damage. Hey ho- they wouldn’t make a living as comedians….