Eligard - 1 mo. , 3 mo., 6 months: any difference in side effects?

Posted by stebro @stebro, Nov 22, 2022

I have read on another forum (Inspire) that the side effects of Lupron Depot are easier to take with the shorter durations. I'm scheduled for a six month injection of Eligard next week. Can anyone confirm what I've heard? Would a couple injections of Eligard 3 month (I'm assuming it's just like Lupron) provide fewer or less harsh side effects than the six month shot? I'm willing to make an extra trip to Rochester if it will have any significant improvement. Monthly would involve too much travel time.
Bless you all. Great forum!

Interested in more discussions like this? Go to the Prostate Cancer Support Group.

@stebro

On the surface none of this seems concerning. But, I have to ask - Is this your first treatment or salvage treatment? Have you had any other treatment? You don't mention surgery or radiation.
And, what was your Gleason score when you were first diagnosed?

Jump to this post

PSA 5.4 prior Radical prostatectomy Gleason 9
Biopsy shows contained. PSA 90 days post 0.331 started 2 year of Eligard and currently 50% completed with 39 radiation tx.

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@stebro

On the surface none of this seems concerning. But, I have to ask - Is this your first treatment or salvage treatment? Have you had any other treatment? You don't mention surgery or radiation.
And, what was your Gleason score when you were first diagnosed?

Jump to this post

Let me see if I can summarize what you have said:

You had a radical prostatectomy with a PSA of 5.4 and a Gleason score of 9. Ninety days after the surgery a biopsy confirmed the PCa was contained and your PSA dropped to 0.331.

At that point your doctors started you on a 39 procedure treatment of radiation and two years on Eligard. After 11 weeks of this treatment your PCA is down to .059 and your testosterone is less than 10.

So, the cancer has not metastasized, so far as you know, your numbers are low and trending down. Different people react differently to leuprolide ADT which makes your lack of side effects difficult to evaluate. Ordinarily, things would look positive.

That said, your doctors are treating you aggressively. I am making the assumption that you are being treated in a first class clinic. They are treating it like high-risk cancer.

This is a quote from the conclusion of a 2015 study: " The authors go on to suggest that men initially diagnosed with low PSA levels and Gleason 8 to 10 disease should be evaluated as candidates for clinical trials studying the use of chemotherapy and other novel agents in the management of very high-risk prostate cancers."

I've just been trying to elicit information from you and summarize it so I can understand your question. You are atypical for this group and I believe you should be addressing your question to your care team rather than to this forum.

If you are still uneasy about your care, Dr. Eugene Kwon, Mayo Clinic Rochester, specializes in advanced cases. A conversation with him might be helpful.

From the Mayo Clinic bio.:
Research in the Kwon Lab focuses on methods to evoke a potent immune response to treat relatively advanced forms of malignancy. Specific areas of research pertain to the preclinical and clinical use of novel vaccines and antibodies to activate antitumoral T cells; the use of hormone manipulations to boost or rebuild host immunity; the treatment of patients with immunotherapy in order to induce clinical tumor regression. A special emphasis is placed on developing highly state-of-the-art immunotherapies to be tested in clinical phase I or II trials to treat patients with prostate, kidney or bladder cancer. Research in the Kwon Lab is supported by a DOD NI Award (PC 991568), DOD IDEA Award (PC020574), NCI/NIH R01 (CA82185), a CaPCure Award and a new DOD-sponsored multi-center Phase II Trial Award (DAMD 17-02-1-0245 & DAMD 17-02-1-0245S1) entitled "A phase II immunotherapeutic trial; combined androgen ablative therapy and CTLA-4 blockade as a treatment for advanced prostate cancer".

God bless you, I wish I could be of more assistance.

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