Every one is different but my daughter was only able to tolerate 2 of the Gemzar treatments, her CA125 went up so they took her off of it and she is now waiting for results from a trip to Mayo before she starts another chemo.
I had 4 1/2 (9) treaments out of my scheduled 6 (12) and it did bring my numbers down, but I was in the hospital 8 times for dehydration from throwing up so they stopped it. (For me, each treatment was 2 parts one week apart.) If they are not giving your mom Aloxi as a pre chemo drug, I would insist on it. I was getting zofran and I had to ask my onc to switch me to Aloxi before I started chemo again & I have had two Topotecan tx and have had very little nausea and no vomiting.
I was on Gemzar for several months. Though it worked great at bringing my numbers down, it just did not work long enough and I had to swithch to something else. Also it was pretty rough on me. I did not have much nausea but it just knocked me down for several days. Some do not have a lot of problems with it at all I hope that your mom is one of those and that it will work great for her.
Chris
I was on gemzar from Nov. until this past May. I did it in combination,, however, with carbo and then with cytoxan. The gemzar was rough on platelets and counts. I did not have any tranfusions, but did have to have red and white blood shots. Donna
This drug is hitting my mom hard, she will have some blood test early next week to check her platelets and her CA 125, I just hope her numbers will come down. Lupita