CEA increasing during chemotherapy

[SteveMi]

My wife had surgery for Stage III Colon Cancer (2 lymphnodes were already affected) so she got 6 months of chemotherapy afterwards (Avastin/5-FU/Leucovorin). CEA dropped from mid 20 pre-surgery to normal levels quickly but half way trough the chemo it started slowly but steadily to rise again. Treatment recently finished and CEA stands at 7 now.

A CT showed a small mass in the lung; my wife is now getting Xeloda until the next checkup. Anybody with similar experience?

[555boston]

Bad news. If CEA went down after surgery and has now started to climb, very likely it wasnt stage III but stage IV. The nodule in the lung sounds very suspicious and i would be worried if it is a metastasis. If it hasnt been biopsied, atleast get a PET scan which will help to know if it has features of cancer.
Xeloda is just like 5FU but by mouth. If the CEA kept increasing during the 5FU treatment and the spot in the lung appeared while on 5FU then, xeloda probably wont help much. Adding oxaliplatin it irinotecan to xeloda may provide better results, but will also lead to more side effects.
first thing to do would be to confirm stage IV disease either with a lung biopsy or a PET.
Good luck.

[SteveMi]

Thanks for your input. Back then the doctor monitored CEA for some more time and as it kept increasing and the number of spots in the lung seemed to increase too he ordered a 2nd course of 12 treatments but including Campto this time. He said as we already know the problem is in the lung there is no need for a PET scan.

Fast forward to now: my wife almost finished her 2nd course of 12 treatments and CEA is not only climbing, it is now climbing faster than before! It almost reached 100 by now!

According to the last CT the spots in the lung stopped growing; but there seems to be a new spot somewhere else (uterus or ovaries; I can't remember)

My questions:

(1) The doctor is still talking about CT only, wouldn't it be high on the time for a PET scan now?

(2) According to Wiki a PET scan causes only a bit more radiation exposure to the patient than a CT, is that correct?

(3) How high can CEA go? (I understand 100 is already quite bad)

[Jack0427]

My husband had the same thing happen but he is just now taking his CHIMO we have just finished # 3 after our resection of the sigmo colon he got a boil in the rectum and they sent to the path and that  came back as a rare cancer with nothing in black and white and the only thing that they know works is to remove the rectum. But since he was just cut down the middle he decided to try the chimo. I hope this works.

I wish you luck