1. < Breast Cancer

Is Heparin with Chemo therapy for TNBC common?

Posted by yakyak9 @yakyak9, Jun 14 9:21am

A few months ago I had a lumpectomy for my recently diagnosed TNBC. All the tests were negative for Mets. As I’m 80 the idea of chemotherapy is giving me great anxiety. Just learned that I’ll need a daily heparin injection. Is that common? So appreciate you all and am most grateful that I have a group like this to share my journey with.

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fortunateoldguy | @fortunateoldguy | Jun 14 9:56am

Your doctor is following best practices. Chemotherapy can cause venous thrombosis (blood clots) which can potentially cause strokes. Heparin can prevent clots from forming. Pre-medications like heparin and others are in people’s best interests.

Heparin has a very short 1.5 hour half-life and can be out of your system in 6-8 hours, so there’s little to no longterm bleeding risk.

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1 reply
yakyak9 | @yakyak9 | Jun 14 10:15am
In reply to @fortunateoldguy "Your doctor is following best practices. Chemotherapy can cause venous thrombosis (blood clots) which can potentially..." + (show)
@fortunateoldguy

Your doctor is following best practices. Chemotherapy can cause venous thrombosis (blood clots) which can potentially cause strokes. Heparin can prevent clots from forming. Pre-medications like heparin and others are in people’s best interests.

Heparin has a very short 1.5 hour half-life and can be out of your system in 6-8 hours, so there’s little to no longterm bleeding risk.

Jump to this post

Thank you. I assumed it would thin my blood for the entire 3 months. Hopefully I can give myself the injection and not have to travel to the treatment center every day.

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1 reply
fortunateoldguy | @fortunateoldguy | Jun 14 10:20am
In reply to @yakyak9 "Thank you. I assumed it would thin my blood for the entire 3 months. Hopefully I..." + (show)
@yakyak9

Thank you. I assumed it would thin my blood for the entire 3 months. Hopefully I can give myself the injection and not have to travel to the treatment center every day.

Jump to this post

You could ask your oncologist if there are any oral agents that you could use in place of heparin like Eliquis or others. It might save you from needing daily injections if there are.

Also ask your oncologist if you only need heparin on treatment days instead of everyday.

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1 reply
yakyak9 | @yakyak9 | Jun 14 3:40pm
In reply to @fortunateoldguy "You could ask your oncologist if there are any oral agents that you could use in..." + (show)
@fortunateoldguy

You could ask your oncologist if there are any oral agents that you could use in place of heparin like Eliquis or others. It might save you from needing daily injections if there are.

Also ask your oncologist if you only need heparin on treatment days instead of everyday.

Jump to this post

Hi. My thoughts exactly. Saw the schedule for me and it’s every day, even July 4th. There are several oral agents including Coumadin. According to all my scans and Doctor there is no cancer present in my body at this time.

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