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BCG side effects
Had my fourth BCG treatment five days ago and have had side effects for the first time. Cough, congestion and lightheaded and achy. It has lasted five days and no improvement, cough is a little worse. Dr doesn’t seem concerned and I am scheduled for fifth treatment in a couple of days. I’m a little concerned that I have a hypersensitivity to the treatment and another one will exacerbate the side effects. Do you think I’m over reacting? I’m 80 and have had thyroid cancer in the past.
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Hello @quahog and welcome to Mayo Connect. My husband had BCG instillations into his bladder and minimal just local side effects. Are you having infusions IV or into bladder? Have you had a fever? Since your symptoms could be a flu or upper respiratory infection, I would recommend you see your primary care physician before another BCG treatment. They can test for the respiratory viruses and give you a quick answer. I would call and postpone your upcoming treatment until you figure this out. If this is a pneumonitis response to the BCG then your oncologist should be taking steps to deal with that and possibly stopping treatment. Start with your PCP and see if you can get an answer.
Thank you for the response. I came up negative on viral infection and my urologist is unconcerned about my symptoms. My cough has just about abated and my other symptoms are just about gone too. I’m scheduled for my fifth treatment tomorrow and they want me to have it (via bladder). The urologist said it was actually a good sign indicating that my immune system is active. Thanks for the advice. I’ll post again post treatment.
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1 ReactionI too am the middle of my BCG treatments.
I had similar effects but I also have COPD so the cough and a bit of congestion could be attributed to the COPD.
One symptom I have now is I lost my appetite for eating. In the 2 weeks I lost 4 lbs. I am forcing myself to eat something nutritious everyday. But a few foods just make me gag. Like steak. So I am avoiding those few foods.
Sorry about the side effects you are experiencing. Apparently nausea is not uncommon but I would certainly notify your Dr about the weight loss. I completed my fifth treatment yesterday and the cough and congestion arrived again about four hours after treatment. The urologist gave me an option to forego the last treatment as he felt the BCG was obviously working well in stimulating my immune system and the sixth treatment was probably unnecessary. If my side effects subside I think I’ll go ahead with the sixth to take full advantage of the treatment. I’ll wait and see how this week goes.