bowel cancer with liver mets

[bev96]

my sister 49 developed acute abdominal pain  went to hospital, Md drained an abcess on her large bowel   did a biopsy of liver/bowel. Called her 2 days later and said she had bowel liver mets. No hope of recovery.no transplant for liver. or surgery.  i have not been able to speak with MD.anybody had any experience like this Anyone have recovery witht raw diet and chemo  or anything else  thanks, and  bev

[Fernando Roque, MD]

Hi Bev.  I'm really sorry to hear about your sister.  My impression from reading your post is that your sister has cancer which originated from the colon, with metastases to the liver.  If this is the case, then her cancer is indeed in an advanced stage.  Striving for a cure (where all the tumor cells are eliminated from her body) may be very difficult at this point.  However, there may still be certain things which can be done for patients with advanced colon cancer, which may help stabilize their disease (if not eliminate it) and allow them to recover enough to be functional for a number of years.

The first thing that can be done is to resect the metastatic lesions in the liver(called "metastasectomy") .  Studies have shown that the five year survival rates of those who undergo liver metastasectomy are dramatically improved to more than 50% (compared to virtually 0% for those who do not undergo the procedure).  Of course, the suitability of your sister for resection has to be assessed by her oncologist and surgeon.  Liver metastases which are smaller in size and lesser in number generally are the best suited for resection.  If liver metastases are initially unresectable, the oncologist may opt to give some chemotherapy to shrink them enough to render them resectable.  

Chemotherapy for advanced colon cancer has also improved over the past years.  In addition to the usual cytotoxic chemotherapy, certain biologic agents (injectable antibodies like cetuximab and bevacizumab) can now be added to the chemo drugs to greatly enhance their efficacy, without increasing toxicity.  You may also wish to discuss this option with your sister's oncologist, to see if these drugs are appropriate for her.

I hope the above information helps.

[Spottedpony]

Your sister wouldn't be a candidate for a liver transplant since she has cancer. Hopefully she will be referred to an Oncologist for evaluation for adjunctive chemo and/or radiation which might help decrease the size of her masses(not a curative treatment). I don't  know of alot of success with raw foods diet. She'll need lots of emotional support, which you seem to be able to give. I'll keep you both in prayer.