just joined
just joined hi , my wife has secondary breast cancer and at the moment undergoin treatment with dosataxol, capecitabine this is her 5th cycle and iv of zometa same time as dosataxol what further treatment can she be put on once this ends ? have you ladies discussed dca ?
theseforums give me a lot of hope thank you all
Helpline Dear asme9
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Breast Cancer Care
Hi there
Sorry your wife has bc secondaries.
Perhaps if you give more information - we can help you a little more.
Firstly - you don’t say where your wife has secondaries - assume bones is one site as she’s on zometa. But why is she on the capecitabine and taxol? Is it for liver or lungs.
Must say i’ve never heard of that combination - I’ve just come off capecitabine because of side effects - but am goig on taxotere next.
If you let us know if your wife is HER2+ or ER2+ we can advise.
good luck
cheers
Moira
Hi there There are plenty of web sites for DCA if you google it. I believe it would not be a good idea for any one to try it at this stage, especially while under hosptial meds as your wife is. There will be other chemos (plenty of options yet) for you wife, when she needs them. There should be some trial results from DCA within the year. My understanding is that self medication could be very dangerous and as the oncs are always telling us, ‘quality of life’ is the goal for us stage IV gals.
I know the DCA stuff sounds tempting - but wouldn’t touch it myself unless absolute last resort. Not yet anyway.
I hope your wife is feeling well.
Jenny
x
whats DCA?
thedcasite.com "This site is to help inform people of the exciting research done on DCA by scientists at the University of Alberta. In January 2007, a team of scientists at the University of Alberta published a paper in the scientific journal, Cancer Cell, describing the discovery that a simple, cheap molecule, DCA, worked to reactivate the apoptosis mechanism of cancer cells, causing rapid shrinkage of tumors in rats. Mitochondrial reactivation represents an entirely new approach to treating cancer.
The tumors shrank 75% in three weeks.
DCA is not patentable. There is no incentive for private money to go into developing DCA as a cancer treatment. This is where we need to step in. We intend to create in one place, all the important information on DCA. "
I just copied this info from the above site.
Jenny.
just joined thank you moira and the rest of you ladies my wife is her2- er+had 14 lymph nodes infected after having epi first time around nothing on ct scan or bone scan , in nov/early dec mri scan liver ultrasound ct scan this was due to small rise in liver function test , detected in liver , lungs ,spine .
had radiotherapy for pain relief helped mobility. in wheelchair , had to wait 4 weeks to start chemo due to xmas holidays , now going through zometa for bones , capcetabine and dostaxol could be trade name taxotere from yew tree this is her 5 cyclce after recent scan improvement in lungs but spots still on liver .
she is definetly going through the mill on this regime .
after 6th cycle can she still stay on capcetabine ? yes i read about dca and concur best to wait untill all other options exhausted .
but the annoying thing was if she had regular monthly blood/liver function test done same time as her zoladex implant things may have been caught earlier she was also taking arimadex but now stopped . onc says returned cancer can be differant ie change from -to+
Hi there again
Thanks for the clarification about your wife’s condition…
And firstly - you are correct docetaxel is in fact taxotere. I’m still surprised about the chemo combination - as its one I’ve never heard of - but hey if it works…
In terms of whether your wife continues on with her current regime -my understanding is that you continue on with that until it stops working - or you can no longer tolerate it due to side effects (which is what happened to me and capecitebane).
My understanding is that whilst you are on chemo - there is no need to also be on anti hormonals.
Your wife has plenty more chemo options available to her when if this current combo fails - just off the top of my head - vineralbine is good for lung mets, carboplatin, gemzar - has your wife had taxol or FEC or AC?
And i have heard from my US support group that you can change HER2 and/or ER+ status. I think its pretty rare and out of all the women who post - only one had that experience.
I wouldn’t beat yourself up too much about what could have been in terms of regular testing. I think it depends on what hospital you attend - but for me I was told I would have an annual mammogram and if I had any other complaints, ie aches and pains - they would be investigated. This seems to be the standard follow up in the UK - but in the US the women seem to have a more rigorous ongoing testing procedure ie regular PET/ct scans, MRIs etc. Personaly i think exposure to those scans on a regular basis is not good for you and as my cheerful oncologist says - “the results are only valid for that day”. Plus my onc doesn’t store much faith in tumour markers - so who knows if it would have been detected earlier.
Anyway hope this helps - if you need anything more let me know.
cheers
Moira