What side effects did you experience after salvage radiation?

After my salvage radiation I have bowel urgency. If You feel something, Youd better find toilet.

My husband had RARP in 2014, no side effects, all good until 2023 when PSA began to rise. Did 33 salvage radiation treatments last year. 6 month retest PSA undetectable, this month came in at .11. Recheck and new scans end of January. His biggest challenge during the radiation was “empty bowel, full bladder”, as someone has mentioned. When we began eating dinner earlier and eliminated some foods (such as salad, sweet potatoes) he did fine. His appointments were at 9:30 am so he also got up around 6 to get all the necessary matters done. He has been lucky with no incontinence or bowel issues. Best of luck to you!

Hello, My salvage radiation 6 yrs after surgery has left no SE’s as of now, one full year after treatment (with ADT). But that could change in the future; radiation sensitivity varies highly from patient to patient and to date, it is still unpredictable.
But the fact that you are ‘partially incontinent’ from surgery ( stress? Lifting?) ‘could’ make your SE’s more pronounced. But what can you do - not do the SRT?
When I saw the list of all the possible SE’s from SRT, I thought - “OK…or die from metastatic prostate cancer”. Wasn’t much of a decision for me after that.
Phil

@restlessandwild I'm so sorry to hear this - I hope it's manageable. What were your particulars going into the radiation (PSA, PSMA, etc), and do they radiation your lymph nodes as well as your prostate bed?

@heavyphil good points!

@abinoone Follow your RO’s advice to the letter: empty rectum/full bladder and you will be fine.
All the RO techs at Sloan reinforced that mantra every single day. One even commented that the only reports she ever got about unfavorable SE’s were related to patients who did not follow the protocol closely enough.
And remember, they will not proceed with the treatment that day if your insides (as measured by a pre-op conebeam CT scan) do not match your simulation profile. Be absolutely sure that your team is going to follow this protocol.
Phil

I previously posted a detailed summary report on my recent salvage RT experience that includes discussion of SEs: https://connect.mayoclinic.org/discussion/finished-8-weeks-of-imrt-yesterday-summary-report/

I would say that the best approach to mitigating SEs is a proper regime of diet, exercise, and sleep. There is no doubt that it is a stressful process, especially achieving the “full bladder/empty rectum” status that is important for mitigating damage to healthy tissues. I’ve attached a document from the U.S. Veteran’s Administration about nutrition and dietary restrictions during RT. This guide helped me more than any info provided by my radiation oncology team. In 8 weeks of IMRT, I only had an issue with too much gas in my rectum once.

Given that I didn’t want to get sick during treatment, I minimized on social activities. Also, didn’t want to spread disease to folks coming in for treatment that were in rough shape from battling cancer. Avoiding social contact could be tough in the midst of the holiday season, but it is definitely something to keep in mind. I would at least avoid anyone who is ill.

During the five weeks after finishing RT, my energy level has progressively come back to normal. I have, however, been dealing with a lot of skin rashes on various part of my body, including penis, buttocks, feet, and legs. I’ve seen my PCP, urologist and dermatologist about the rashes. No one thinks any of them are a direct result of the radiation, but likely something that is opportunistically flaring up because my immune system is out of whack from the RT. No one thinks they are anything serious, Some rashes have been extremely itchy, others not. The rashes seem to be subsiding but they do keep popping up, just not as severely.

Best wishes for successful treatment. Don’t be shy about expressing issues/concerns to your care team. Be kind to yourself and roll with the ups and downs as best you can. Eight weeks of RT involved a lot of drudgery, but I got through it one day at a time.

Mel