Sutent aka sunitinib

[Mark4124]

Has anyone tried this...? My mother's Dr believes that conventional chemo will not be effective after the complete failure of gemzar. We live close to Dana Farber so the Dr wants to set her up with a clinical trial for sutent? My mother has MMMT Fallopian tube cancer.

[ala58]

My sister just was diagnosed with MMMT ovarain cancer.  She is recoveing from surgery and meets with her gyn onc, Wed. to discuss the test results.  How is your friend doing?  I am hoping she is responding well to treatment.

Thanks so much
ala58

[JW35]

I read your post about your mom. My very dear friend is currently having isofamide treatments for stage 3C ovarian MMMT at the Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia. She was diagnosed in October 2007. How is your mom doing? Because this type of cancer is so rare, there is little information about it. Finding someone else who has the same diagnosis hopefully will lead to mutual support. Thanks so much.
JW35

[Helmar]

Hi Mark... Like your Mum, I also have just the 'common garden variety' Oncologist, and he is doing really well for me.:-)  I was dx Stage 4 in Feb 04 and wasn't expected to last too long, as I was covered in cancer... but here I am, feeling well and doing fine after 3 1/2 years. I've met a couple of other women with similar dx to me, who have been treated by a Gyn/Oncol. but sadly, they are no longer with us. My Oncol. travels overseas on a regular basis, and stays up with what's new around the world in treating cancer, and he also has a couple of patients with Stage 3 and 4 Ovca who are still doing well after 12 and 16 years respectively. I would be happy to be here in another 8 or 12 years, so I don't have a problem with my Oncol. He must be doing something right. If your Mum is doing well with the new Oncol. and she is happy with how she is being treated, then I don't see any reason to change. *just my thoughts*.... I wish your Mum well, and hope she will continue to ward off this beast. Hugs to you both....Helen...

[Christiane Payton]

Hi Mark,

My mother was diagnosed with a stage 3C MMMT ovarian cancer (also called a carcinosarcoma.)  She is being treated by a gynecologist oncologist in NJ.  She is on a special chemo program that uses ifosfomide to attack the sarcoma part of her cancer.  When she first presented with abdominal pain, she was told by the head of surgery that she probably only had a "bad cyst" because her CA 125 levels were only 35.....the MRI told a very different story.  Good luck to you and your mom.

Christiane in OR

[WomenEducatingWomen]

Mark,
I am sorry about the dx of your Mother. It is very important that your mother finds a gyne onc to treat her illness. Although a med onc could very well treat her, they do not specialize in gyne diseases and she will recieve the most up to date treatment options with a gyne onc. You are in a great area with a high concentration of docs. Don't give up, a gyne onc will take her on. Keep the faith and keep looking. Many gyne cancers are best treated with targeted therapy as opposed to a general chemotherapy drug(s). A Gyne Oncologist that will utilize chemo assays will be your best bet. There are several chemo assay companies out there. Google 'precision therapeutics' and 'oncotech' to learn more about options. Your mother is blessed to have a son active in her treatment. Keep the Faith.

[Mark4124]

Interesting... My mother doesn't have either aceites or CA-125s that are significant. She never was CA-125 positive. The only way we can know aside from symptoms is thru PET or CT scans. Yes... I actually like this Dr. And in this case it is the exact oppisite of what I always hear on this forum. We had a gyno oncologist and she was terrible. She had too many patients, no urgency about my mothers cancer, and barely reacted to the MMMT diagnosis. When my mother had the scan that revealed all the mets she canceled our appointments. She cited "not wanting my mother to drive to see her" but really I think she knew she messed up and wanted to drop her as a patient. Now we are just with the plain old oncologist. She is great... she is of course a cancer doc so definately has medical opinions on all of this, but she knows the limits of her knowledge and consults with Boston when she feels she is over her head. The gyn oncologist was always right. This oncologist has the humility to realize that she needs to consult. I like that relationship much better.

[Jatoo]

Dear Mark:

I am sorry about your mom having MMMT Ovarian which is rather a rare disease.

However you are right now giving valuable information to the patients of this forum by giving them more ammunitions to fight this disease. Sunitinib is similar to Sorafenib and also Avastin. All of them have antiangiogenesis activities. In layman's term they stop the pathway or proteins that feed tumors of food and nutrients. So eventually tumors will die and also they cannot form new ones.

Sunitinib was approved by the US FDA to treat metastatic kidney cancer in January 2006. In a phase 2 clinical trial of Sorafenib on 202 patients with metastatic kidney or renal cancer, 73 patients or 36 per cent had tumor shrinkage. Avastin is also relatively highly successful in its clinical trials even without combination with chemo drugs, it put patients on complete remission.

Her doctor is smart in putting your mom in this clinical trial. My wife is also on Avastin with Gemzar and she is relatively doing well. Her CA 125 of ~500 when she started is now down to 90. The lowest in months. Ascites has been reduced significantly and tapping stopped almost right after the first cycle.

I hope and pray that this drug will put your mom in complete remission.

All the best,
Jatoo