Stage 4 nsclc mets to adrenal gland - left side

muddycreeker · New User Joined: 16 Feb 2008 Posts: 1

Hi, my name is Jack. My wife (63 yrs. old) was diagnosed june 2007 with stage 4 nsclc, non-squamous, adenocarcinoma with bone mets to right arm (humerus). They did immediate surgery on humerus, driving a titanium nail the length of the bone and securing it with screws at each end. Fortunately, miraculously there had been no breakage despite the porous nature of the bone. She began chemo in August, carboplatin and I believe paclitaxel (sp?). She had two of those treatments and then added Ivastin(sp?) for two more treatments. Had to stop due to neuropathy development in her hands and feet. CT scan in Oct showed considerable shrinkage of primary (60%) and other tumors, with no progession. I forgot to mention they did radiation (10X) on her humerus and she continues to get Zometa to this day. After six weeks on Ivastin the next CT scan (Dec) showed the primary tumor had grown in size, but,not back to its original 5 cm and still no sign of progression. Throughout this my wife had recovered mentally and physically pretty well to the point where she could take care of herself around the house and get out occasionally with friends or attend church. Her pain level has been pretty well controlled with Vicodin in not large quantities.

In early January she began a clinical trial, phase II, E7389. After six weeks they did another scan. The primary tumor enlarged only slightly, but the cancer has now progressed to her adrenal gland, left side. Her energy level has decreased alot in the past couple of weeks, and she is currently bedridden with what I hope is a common malady such as a cold. She is being treated with anti-biotics for sinus infection. She has not much appetite at all. We are seeing oncologist Tuesday, but my question is if anyone has experience with adrenal mets from nsclc and what symptoms might we expect? What about treatments? Two we were told to consider would be Alimta or Tarceva?

pbj11 · Site Admin Joined: 12 May 2007 Posts: 822

Hi Jack,

Welcome to this board and I'm sorry you have the need to be here.

My brother-in-law had an adrenal met, but I don't remember much about his pain level. They watched it. I think they watched it too long without treatment, but that was the only tumor activity showing up at the time. He had already done brain surgery, brain radiation, and two different lines of chemo though. I still don't think his doc's were aggressive enough.

There are still many, many different lines of chemotherapy out there for your wife. Alimta, avastin, gemzar, navelbine, cpt-11, taxotere and tarceva with more in trials. My husband had an allergic reaction to the carboplatin on his 8th cycle of carbo/taxol, so he couldn't take any more drugs in the platinum family (cisplatin). Still, he had many more lines that benefited him.

Our choice was to go with known, approved agents to fight his cancer and that worked. You have to delicately balance the clinical trials, because a lot of them won't accept you with any fairly heavy prior treatment. Our thinking was to go with the known. Just our perspective.

Might I suggest popping in to Dr. West's site Onctalk.com and doing a search for adrenal on there? He is a oncologist with a specialty in lung cancer who has a fabulous board full of articles for patients.

Good luck and keep your hope high for better days.

PBJ
_________________
Husband diagnosed with NSCLC Stage IV. (Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer) Fought & lived 2 1/2 years with multiple lines of treatment.

Post describing our battle: http://cancerforums.net/viewtopic.php?t=7026&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

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