A question about mom with lung cancer with met to brain

passcon93 · Regular Joined: 25 Oct 2007 Posts: 11 Location: CT

My mom has been diagnosed with lung cancer with met to brain in sept 2007. She under went 15 radiation treatments and 6 chemo treat once every 3 weeks. about a month ago she develped numb feet with throbbing pain. She is now on percocets. She also started to be very wobbly on her feet and dizzy. She has almost fallen over a couple times. The doctor keeps saying it is the chemo but she has not had a treatment in over a month. She also has started to wear depends because she can't hold it in anymore. Does anyone know what might be going on? She recently had an MRI but it showed no new growth. ANd orginal tumor still shrinking.

brainman

Hi passcon93, I do not know what is causing her numb feet. What is sounds like is peripheral neuropathy probably caused by the chemo she has received. Make sure you tell her medical team about this new development and work with them to find a solution.
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Site Administrator and long-term cancer survivor
1992 Astrocytoma grade 2, left motor strip
2005 Recurrence this time said to be an Oligodendoglioma grade 3, same location.
My Story Part 1: http://cancerforums.net/viewtopic.php?p=7350
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Tera · Senior User Joined: 31 Dec 2007 Posts: 153

My mom had NSCLC with mets to the brain, adrenals, and spine, and had difficulty in getting around. She also had to wear Depends later. Mets to the brain can be behind some symptoms. Have they checked her for mets to the spine? That turned out to be the cause of some of mom's problems.

passcon93 · Regular Joined: 25 Oct 2007 Posts: 11 Location: CT

THank you for both your replys. My mothers doctor just wants to blame everything on the chemo and I really think something else is going on. My mom is not getting better as her doctor suggested she would since stopping the chemo approx. month ago. She is scheduled for a cat scan on wednesday. Do you know if this scan will pick up spine mets? my mom also has adrenal met.

Tera · Senior User Joined: 31 Dec 2007 Posts: 153

Not sure if the CAT scan will pick up spine mets, perhaps someone might know that answer for you. The reason I found out mom had spinal mets is because she had a PET scan. She was getting weaker and had more difficulty getting around and could not even stand on her own. On her last visit to the radiation oncologist, she could not tolerate her WBR that day. Due to her condition, the onc nurse told me they were going to do the PET scan to see if she had spinal mets.

brainman

I agree with Tera in that a PET scan will detect mets to any bones better than a CAT scan. Nevertheless, a CAT scan can detect bone mets if the are of any significant size. A CAT scan will show more details than a PET scan which will help in the treatment decisions. In fact, often, they are used in combination.

My best wishes and prayers.
_________________
Jim
Site Administrator and long-term cancer survivor
1992 Astrocytoma grade 2, left motor strip
2005 Recurrence this time said to be an Oligodendoglioma grade 3, same location.
My Story Part 1: http://cancerforums.net/viewtopic.php?p=7350
My Story Part 2: http://cancerforums.net/viewtopic.php?t=8029
Blog http://jimhawkinsport.blogspot.com/

pbj11 · Site Admin Joined: 12 May 2007 Posts: 982

Hi Pass,

Sorry to hear about the latest problems. The other's are right -- PET's should pick up bone mets. My first thought also was peripheral neuropathy combined with the meds.

Go to Onctalk.com and do a search for paraneoplastic syndrome. This is a mixture of side-effects that can happen to some cancer patients and there is information on these at that website.

Good luck,
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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