Can anyone share their experience with Pluvicto?

You are getting very bad advice from your oncologist! Pluvicto has been approved by the FDA for several years for commercial use, after many years of clinical trials and peer-reviewed publications. Second, it is no longer a requirement to undergo chemotherapy before Pluvicto. You need to find a new oncologist ASAP. This one is either not current on prostate cancer treatments or doesn't want to bother getting up to date. Run, don't walk, away!

How much do you trust your oncologist?

He/she is just totally wrong in telling you the FDA doesn't have enough data to support it's use.

It USED to be that you had to have been treated with chemotherapy before qualifying for Pluvicto. That is no longer true. I just had my fifth Pluvicto treatment and I elected to not have chemotherapy.

There seems to be a hierarchy or tier to all the various types of cancer treatments available. A person newly diagnosed would not likely start out with Pluvicto. It's quite a ways down the line after several other, less drastic, avenues have been tried and have run their course.

It sounds like you might benefit from a second opinion from a different, more knowledgeable oncologist.

My experience with Pluvicto hasn’t begun yet because my Oncologist tells me the FDA doesn’t have enough data to support its use. I am told that I have to be treated
with chemotherapy before I qualify for Pluvicto.
Can someone help me make sense of this.
Thank you, Philnob

Completed all 6 Pluvicto immediately following 6 rounds of Docetaxel and carboplatin chemotherapy. The entire treatment was completed 8 weeks ago which all occurred in one year. This is a copy and paste from my choline PET scan this week which was 8 weeks after final Pluvicto:

Impression
Complete response to interval therapy. No definitive PSMA avid locally recurrent or metastatic disease.

Will return in 3 months for a PSMA scan.

Yes it is. I wish you the best of luck on your journey.

Yes and that’s great 🤗

Everybody makes their own decisions in this area. I choose to be much more conservative than the official guidelines. I came to that conclusion by monitoring my radiation levels on a regular basis and having a strong desire to NOT expose friends, loved ones, caregivers to unnecessary radiation. Driving home is fine, with an acceptable level of radiation exposure, although I do drive myself in order to not subject my wife to even that level of exposure. I just had treatment #5. My personal protocol protocol is to isolate myself for a week (not "three feet" like they say, but real isolation - sleep alone, no physical contact whatsoever), and then allow brief minimal contact (a hug, a handshake, being in the same room but still maintaining the three foot separation) for the second week after treatment. During that two weeks my radiation level continues to decline on a daily basis but I keep measuring it so that I know what my condition really is and how much radiation exposure a person would have from me by being in my proximity. At the end of two weeks my radiation level is minimal and I am back to full contact mode - sleep in same bed, kissing OK, snuggling on the couch watching Netflix, etc. We each make our own decisions in this area.

Russ just got home from his 2 nd pluvicto injection from the mayo today ! They told us no worries u can drive him home ! Sleep in the same bed ! Just no kissing for 3 days ! 😊

Just got back home from my Pluvicto treatment number 5. I drove myself as I am generally tolerating these infusions reasonably well with my primary side effects being constipation and general tiredness for a week or two.

Today they had to poke me three times before they got the needle installed properly. Ugh. I'm not real good with needles. I'd make a bad drug addict. LOL.

Anyway, I made it home ok after the hour and a half drive, but now I'm weak, worn out, and crashed on the bed in my bedroom where I will basically isolate myself for one week with no contact. The official guidelines are to stay a minimum of three feet away from everyone for three days, but my personal opinion is I should just completely isolate myself for a week as long as I am able to function without help - i.e. have the ability to feed myself and take care of my bathroom needs without assistance. I tend to be extra cautious about exposing anyone else to my radiation.

To Add to my previous reply to the question about the radiation exposure to the person driving a friend sitting diagonally in the back seat - as I said, you likely are getting about three millirems of radiation each hour, so during a two hour drive you would be getting a out six millirems of exposure. My conclusion that that is something I would not be concerned about is based on the official radiation guidelines which say a person should limit their annual exposure to no more than 100 millirems. So in one drive you would be getting about six percent or so of your annual limit. In my world this would be totally acceptable in order to do this for a friend.

I also agree with the other person's observation about the reality of transportation in Manhattan. The doctors give their theoretical guidelines to stay three feet away from people for three days (not enough in my opinion) but they can do nothing about the reality of any patient who is forced to rely on public transportation.

I am due for my fifth infusion tomorrow. Stay tuned for further developments.