Taxotere/Aradia/Zometa side effects: Blurred vision and eye pain

[HumbleBee]

My 40-year-young wife has been fighting breast cancer for 10 years. She finished a 6-month treatment with Taxotere and Aradia (for bone repair) about a month ago. Since then, she switched on to Zomeda (another bone treatment). She has had two infusion of Zomeda so far, the last one was done yesterday. About two weeks ago, she started to have blurred vision and headache; espectially in and around her right eye. She also became sensitive to light (day light,TV, computer monitor, etc.). The pain is getting more severe and becoming intolerable. She also feels quite nauseous since last night. Her oncologist has ordered a brain CAT scan. These sysmtoms are new and worrisome to her. While waiting for the scan results, does anyone know about the symtoms and the cure for it? TIA.

[snowagl]

A related discussion, side effects for chemotherapy was started.

[HumbleBee]

Thank you all for your response and suggestions! My wife ended up in the ER two days ago for the horrible pain behind the right eye and severe vomiting. The head CAT scan show no abnormality. She could not have MRI scan due to another medical condition. MRI would give more info. on the brain tissues. She had CTA done today, and we are waiting for the results.

The opthalmologist said yesterday that she has "third nerve pulsi"; but wasn't sure about the cause at this point due to the lack of MRI result. Our oncologist has also suggested spinal tap test should it be necessary, as "SnowWoman" has mentioned (ThanX again!). My wife is doing better today without pain killer and anti-nausea medicine.

It seems like chemo patient should stay away from bright light and limit the use of their eyes during and shortly after the treatment. Unfortunately, nobody has told us so until this happened. Today, I learned that that was the case for our two cancer patient acquaintances. Nobody told us four years ago that Adriamycine (A)+ Cytoxcine (C) would dramatically increase the cardiotoxicity of the A and the effect of A to the heart is accumulative. My wife ended up having her heart severely damaged by the chemo with AC four years ago. I sincerely hope people learn from our story and be very careful in deciding and monitoring the chemo.

HumbleBee

[seven7]

The Taxotere chemo treatments I had caused my eyes to water excessively.  The watering made it hard for me to see...blurring my vision.    After I completed the taxotere,  my eyes stopped the excess watering.

[SnowWoman]

My Mom had problems with blurred/double vision as a result of mets in her CSF (cerebral spinal fluid).  (In her case it was lymphoma rather than breast cancer.) When they did a head scan nothing showed as there was no actual "lump".  It wasn't until they did a spinal tap and looked at the CSF that they were able to see the cancer cells there.  The build up of cells was enough to cause pressure on the nerves causing the vision problems and eventually paralysis to one side of her face.  She responded well to chemo treatments and radiation and there was a vast improvement in her symptoms in just a couple weeks.  They did have to treat this separately with chemo directly into the CSF since the "brain barrier" tends to keep systemic chemo from entering this area.  On the plus side, the barrier also tends to keep the CSF chemo treatments from affecting the rest of the body and the side effects were minimal.  If they don't see anything on the CAT scan and the symptoms persist, you would want to be sure they have checked the CSF for any sign of the disease.  Good luck.

[CCF-RN,MSN-rf]

Dear HumbleBee:  Although zometa can cause some headaches, the blurred vision is concerning.  A CAT scan is necessary to help determine the source of her pain.