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Breast Cancer (Expert Forum)
AC treatment for breast cancer
Questions posted in the Breast Cancer Forum are answered by medical professionals from The Cleveland Clinic. Topics include Breast Biopsy, Chemotherapy, Hormone Therapy, Lumps, Lumpectomy, Lymph node dissection, Lymphedema, Mammograms, Mastectomy, Radiation Therapy, Reconstruction, Self Breast Exam, and Surgery.
AC treatment for breast cancer
by baileycat, Jun 01, 2005 12:00AM
I was diagnosed with invasive ductal breast cancer three months ago at age 47. I had a lumpectomy with sentinal node removal. Node negative, stage one, grade one, Estrogen and Progesterin receptor postive, FISH negative. 1.5 x1 x .7cm. clean margins. Treatment plans was 4 rounds of AC, 6 weeks of radiation and hormonal therapy. I know this is a good prognosis, and consider myself lucky it was not worse than it is.
After round three of chemo, and three weeks of fever I find I have neutropenia (SP?) or Leukopenia(SP)induced fever. My blood count went from 500 to 18. I was finally put on antibiotics.
I am so very tired and nauseated all the time. I cannot seem to find relief. In addition, I've lost confidence in my oncologist. I want to quit chemo after three treatments, but go on to complete my radiation and hormonal therapy. The rebuttal from my oncologist is all the papers are on 4 treatments, not three.
Can you give me a more compelling argument than this?
thank you in advance.
After round three of chemo, and three weeks of fever I find I have neutropenia (SP?) or Leukopenia(SP)induced fever. My blood count went from 500 to 18. I was finally put on antibiotics.
I am so very tired and nauseated all the time. I cannot seem to find relief. In addition, I've lost confidence in my oncologist. I want to quit chemo after three treatments, but go on to complete my radiation and hormonal therapy. The rebuttal from my oncologist is all the papers are on 4 treatments, not three.
Can you give me a more compelling argument than this?
thank you in advance.
Doctor's Answer
by CCF-RN,MSN-rf, Jun 02, 2005 12:00AM
Dear baileycat: When chemotherapy protocols are designed, it is based on research. The research, which tallies results based on large groups of subjects, helps us to determine the optimal (or best) dose, frequency, and number of cycles for a given disease. The purpose of chemotherapy treatment is to reduce the risk for breast cancer recurrence and to improve your chances for long-term survival. The available data indicates that decreasing chemotherapy, by either reducing the dose or partially finishing the full set of treatments, leads to decreased chemotherapy benefit. Ultimately, the choice is yours. If you should decide to complete the therapy, it may be helpful for you to know (and discuss with your oncologist) that there are medications available to prevent the white blood cell count from dropping dangerously. Also, there are very good medications available for nausea and, if this is a problem, perhaps a different drug would work better. Good luck with your decision.
go ahead and do the 4th round of AC. Otherwise you will always wonder. You will feel better eventually. Plus, each chemo is different. I did 4 rounds of AC and I felt different after each one. However, my oncologist was very on top of my side effects and did everything she could to improve them. AC is a tough chemo, but it works. I know a lady that is a 25 year survivor and that's what she did. I also did Taxatere, which was much easier for me. My advice is do what your doctor suggest, oncologist are probably the brightest doctors out there. They know what they are doing and are very knowledgeable on what has been proven to work. Realize his/her goal is to keep you alive and cure you of this cancer so you never have to deal with it again. So to them, the fact that you feel bad for awhile is nothing in the big picture. Good luck in your decision.