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Anyone had Concurrent Radiation and Chemo Therapies?
Lower Left lobectomy is off the table. Surgeon said that even if I survived the surgery, my quality of life would be severely diminished (limited lung capacity).
So I will begin concurrent proton radiation and chemo therapies on March 9.
Has anyone here gone through these concurrent therapies? Any suggestions?
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Mine was traditional photon radiation with concurrent chemotherapy. This can be more debilitating than sequential treatments but it is also more effective. Think 1+1=3. The chemo injures the DNA weakening it and making the cancer's DNA more susceptible to the destruction by the radiation and the damage the radiation causes the DNA making it more susceptible to the chemo. The cells with the damaged DNA cannot reproduce when it's time for them to split.
My mass continued to shrink and consolidate for two years after treatment ended.
Btw, the proton radiation does less damage to surrounding tissue.
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2 Reactions@andycapp
I agree with @denzie. Proton and SBRT are quite different than the radiation we used to hear about. This radiation is extremely targeted with high doses, shortening the treatment time (depending on size of target). My consulting doctor strongly encouraged me not to stop chemo.
Last year we hit my lung and later a spot on my liver. At this point, both are gone.
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2 ReactionsThank you denzie and gamaryanne!
I agree that what I've read about Proton Radiation is that the power is reduced until the beam is over the target, then turned on, and then reduced when it is past the target. This reduces the radiation to non targeted tissues of vital organs like the heart and esophagus.
I recognge that the concurrent combination of radiation and chemo therapies is much more effective than doing the therapies sequentially.
Since we had to stop the combintion of chemo and imuno tharapies previously (December) because It was damaging my liver, I have some concerns about starting chemo again but I'm willing to give it anothder try.
Gamaryanne, how did the chemo therapy go and what did you do to mitigatre the side effects?
Again, thank you to you both for your positive input.
Andy Capp`
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1 Reaction@andycapp
Immunotherapy always has the chance of damaging our organs as sometimes it can’t tell what is friend and what is foe.
I had standard radiation (Cyberknife) and chemo concurrently after my upper right lobectomy in 2018. I've been on Tagrisso since 2020 and have never had a recurrence below my neck.
I think you'll be fine with both, just a bit more sleepy than with chemo alone. I wish you all the best.
Matthew
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1 Reaction@flusshund
Thanks for the reassuring words, Matthew!
@denzie hi I am reading all the stories so I can understand my nephews therapy for lung cancer stage 4 he has radiation and chemo now just chemo. He lives in UK I am doing as much research as I can. Thank you
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2 ReactionsMy radiation completed before my chemo in 2011. Do you know if he will have maintenance chemo?
Every country has their own standard of care. The Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation is the largest if not the only leading cancer foundation in the UK. They have an oncology nurse on call during regular business hours who can answer questions and a patient to patient page very similar to this one. I have read many good things about them from other patients.
https://roycastle.org/
Thank you. He is having some treatment chemos, now shorter times. I will tell him about Roy Castle.
Something else you might want to look into is Maggie's Centres. They have virtual and in person meetings for cancer patients at a number of locations around the UK.
https://www.maggies.org/