Metastic Breast Cancer

[Napoleon]

Sir:  What type of chance does a person have that has bone metastisis, not being able to to chemo due to a very low ejection fraction, is on Femara and Zometa and was treated with radiation?  Many positive lymph nodes involved. Isn't hormonal therapy just a temporary thing and most of them don't work?

[SunnyFla]

Hi,
I'm a 47 year old advanced breast cancer patient, with bone mets...been through all the standard procedures..chemo, modified radical mastectomy...more chemo,
radiation..tamoxifen, aromasin, faslodex w/zometa...and none of these treatments seemed to work, because my cancer markers keep rising..and now my oncologist is suggesting chemo, again. I would like to know what the survival rate of this situation is?
My oncologist is working slowly, considering, how uncomfortable I am..I was thinking of getting an other opinion..but my cancer is progressing at a rate that I don't know if I have time on my side to do so.

[CCF-RN,MSN-JS]

Dear Napoleon, The goal of treatment of metastatic breast cancer is to control the disease and symptoms of the disease for as long as possible.  Hormonal therapy can be very effective in doing this.  There are statistics about how effective a certain drug will be based on averages of groups of patient responses.  However, how long that treatment will be effective in an individual is impossible to foresee.  As long as the treatment is controling the cancer, and the patient is able to tolerate the treatment it can be continued.