Extensive Small cell Lung Cancer
A family member was diagnosed with extensive small cell lung cancer. Has there been anyone that survived this after treatment ? And what is expected ?
Interested in more discussions like this? Go to the Lung Cancer Support Group.
Hello @caron16, Welcome to Mayo Connect. As I'm sure you've read small cell lung cancer can be devastating for any family. With any cancer diagnosis, there are many variables that my impact how well treatments work or how open the patient is to various treatments. Overall heath and age are big factors, along with outlook on a future life. It's never an easy situation, and not always one that we as family members or patients have complete control over. Treatments are often curtailed to the specific type of cancer and the drivers of the cancer.
Here's a link to another Small Cell discussion that's been going on for quite some time. You may want to skip to the more recent posts of that discussions (https://connect.mayoclinic.org/discussion/small-cell-lung-cancer-1/?pg=23#chv4-comment-stream-header ). I can relay that the mentor that started the discussion (@merpreb) is still lurking with us sometimes but she's stepped away from her mentoring duties. She is a 25+ year survivor, and quite an inspiration.
@sksnow is another recently active member in the small cell discussions.
How is your family member handling the news of the diagnosis? Do they, and you, have trust in their team?
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Tough question. I started out as limited small cell, only one lung nodule and several nearby lymph nodes.
I had Cisplatin and Etoposide for chemotherapy and 33 rounds of radiation to my chest. I have SIADH that came with the cancer that never went away so I knew it hadn’t worked. I convinced my doc to do another scan right away and viola, it’s now extensive. It cleared up the lung and metastinal nodes but now it’s in my spine and neck nodes. Now we’re trying Keytruda, an immunotherapy that hasn’t shown much promise for small cell. Most everyone I talk to has had it come back so that’s something to be prepared for. I’m just here working on my acceptance skills at this point. Praying the Keytruda doesn’t cause tooo many bad side effects. Welcome to the group and hugs all around.