My sister had to call the hospice nurse out today

samchaney · Regular Joined: 30 Apr 2008 Posts: 39

My sister seemed to be doing well after her first dose of chemotherapy. However, her blood is down so they have delayed her 2nd dose. Now she is having terrible sweats and the morphine patch didn't seem to be helping. She called the nurse out today and they have changed her from morphine patch to a higher dose of morphine in sustained relief capsules. They said her morphine patch at 75mg was not enough. Does this mean she is going downhill already. ??? She was also asked to assign someone as her carer as she seems to be very forgetful and missing her tablets. She sounds very slurred when I talk to her on the phone. How high a dose of morphine does a lung cancer patient normally have when it is nearing the end.

pbj11 · Site Admin Joined: 12 May 2007 Posts: 1262

Sam,

I'm sorry to hear that your poor sister is having difficulty controlling the pain. I don't know a darn thing about pain issues and hope someone will be by shortly to give you an answer.

Morphine can make her sound slurred too. Pretty strong stuff. My husband also experienced sweating a lot throughout his journey. It can be from the chemo, cancer, or the pain meds.

Take care and God bless,
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

koikkeril · Super Moderator Joined: 29 Jul 2007 Posts: 334

Hi,
I am sorry that you sister is having a hard time and not feeling well.. I found my husbands morphine needed to be increased and decreased as and when the situation changed regarding chemo treatments etc., Some people do not suffer with so much pain as it depends where the tumour is and whether the cancer has spread. Morphine can make someone speak slurred and 75mg of morphine is not in my opinion a high dose! My husband was on 600mg morning and evening (slow acting) and up to 50mg fast acting every 4hrs if needed. When his tumour had gone he reduced his morphine to zero! Sadly my husbands ending is now close and he is having morphine directly through a pump, the quantity of morphine is 3g (3,000).. He is also have another morphine by IV. The quantity of morphine cannot say that your sister is getting near to the end. My husband went up and then down...Chemo also can make a person feel extremely tired and forgetful, but its most likely the morphine that is doing this.
My husband has and still experiences sweats but I always felt the sweats were because the cancer was active though it can be because of many other reasons.
Try to keep positive Sam, I am keeping you in my thoughts, God Bless Koik

simplyklb

At one point, my dad was taking 105 mg of morphine a day. He took 60 mg of long-lasting morphine and 45 mg of short-acting morphine a day. It was getting so bad that he was confused and hallucinating. I had to get his pain meds changed. Dad seems to do OK with the Oxycodone (5 to 10 mg once every four hours) and Fentanyl patch (25 mg). Now if I can get him to move slower and not move his recliner around, I would be happy. Smile

Kristi
_________________
Dad - Andy, 70, diagnosed with SCLC in May 2008
2/20/38 - 10/15/08 Fly high, Dad!
Mom - Jackie, 67, diagnosed with NSCLC in May 2008

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