freeio
Senior User
Joined: 20 Dec 2004
Posts: 116
Location: Guntersville, Alabama
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 Posted: Mon Jul 23, 2007 10:55 am Post subject: Post Whipple events |
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Sandi,
I do not know that anything about cancer treatment can be considered standardized. It varies depending on the doctor, the medical institutions involved, and the actual facts of the cancer daignosos and the outcome of the surgery.
Having said that, let me give you my sequence, which started with a Whipple on October 21, 2004. It took about eight weeks for me heal well enough from the surgery for the next treatment. They waited until the skin had entirely reformed over the incision, and because I had an infection, it took a bit longer then normal. In my case they started with the radiation and chemo simultaneously, and that ran 28 weekdays. The chemo agent was Xeloda, which as you say is much like 5-FU in a pill form. Then I got two weeks off, and then we started chemo by itself with more Xeloda for four two week cycles. At that point they simply watched me to see what happened, and for nearly a year, nothing happened. All appeared well.
In March of 2006 I started having odd symptoms (extreme lower back pain) and so they looked further and found that my CA19-9 cancer marker had begun to rise again, and so it appeared that the cancer had returned. They ran a PET scan, bone scan, and CT scan, and found that the cancer had metastacised into my back and periteoneal cavity. So now I had bone cancer and a tumor above my kidneys, wrapped around all the big blood vessels.
The next treatment series began in June 2006 and this time they used chemo alone, and used Gemzar. That kept things in check rather well until November 2006, when my CA19-9 tumor marker levels were down to 30, which is high in the normal range. At that point I was given a 90 day respite from the chemo (yes, there are side-effects).
When I was next tested in February 2007, the tumor marker was rising again, so they put me back on Gemzar. When that did not slow the advance of the cancer, they put me on three chemo drugs at the same time: Gemzar, Tarceva, and Oxaliplatin. That is what I am on now. The side effects from the three drugs are bearable, but do put a dent in life.
So what is my prognosis? They honestly do not know. Anything could happen, although I am not counting on getting better at this point. But I could theoretically go on indefinitely like this, if I can stand the chemo treatment, and the cancer marker does not rise further.
Complaints? I have none. I have had the best treatment, from fine doctors at a great facility (Kirklin Clinic, part of the UAB Hospital in Brimingham, Alabama) and after nearly three years since diagnosis I can still get up and work every day. Things do not always turn out badly.
If you are interested in my day-by-day thoughts on cancer and treatment, see my pancreatic cancer blog here:
http://diehlmartin.com/cancer.html
Marty
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whipple procedure, Oct. 21, 2004
28 days of radiation
56 days of Chemo using Xeloda
diagnosed as progressive recurrent pancreatic adenocarcinoma (Stage IV) Jun. 20, 2006
was treated with gemcitabine, oxaliplatin, and tarceva, which all failed.
Cancer blog: http://diehlmartin.com/cancer.html |
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