Questions about radiation for prostate cancer: Can I drive myself?

For nine weeks I drove myself 130 miles round trip to 44 radiation treatments without any major problems, although I routinely had to stop along the roadside to urinate several times on every trip and occasionally to defacate. Frequency and urgency were one of the side effects I experienced. In addition I continued to farm full time and some days I spent many hours driving a tractor, ATV and a pickup during my daily work before and after my trips to the cancer center. It wasn’t easy but it certainly wasn’t as difficult as other health challenges I’ve experienced in recent years.

@tlems
I think your weakness came from the Lupron not the radiation treatments. Although there will be some fatique with radiation.

I think the poster was asking about radiation treatments and driving not the hormone treatments side affects which could affect driving as well as many other activities.

@paulcalif was asking only about radiation treatments not hormone treatments and radiation.

With my SBRT I only had a 12 minute drive. After each treatment I came home and went for a 3 mile walk. Only felt fatigued the first evening and I think that was from the stress/relief that treatment had started as much as it was a side effect of the radiation,

Stay Strong Brothers!

I was only asking about driving after radiation BUT, to be honest, I hadn't considered ADT. I Don't know if I'll need it???
I'm still in the dark as to treatment and even the extent of my disease. I'm scheduled for my Petscan Tuesday. Hoping for the best. Thanks everyone!!

Kaspar,

What was your criteria deciding UCLA MRIdian SBRT over Loma Linda Proton therapy.

I understand that SBRT is 5 treatments over 10 days. Proton treatment might be 30, 40 treatments. Is that the deciding factor in your case?

The Proton at Loma Linda even though pioneers is long in the tooth. It’s older tech. If I was going to do Proton San Diego would probably do better. After doing research more I felt the MRI tracking of the prostate at 4-8x a second was superior. Proton isn’t as accurate as it is sold to be and is easily deflected by calcifications, it has lateral scatter and in studies I read MRLinac SBRT was superior in saving OAR especially the nerve bundle. Then add to that 5 treatments in a row compared to I believe they said 39. The very low side effects from MRLinac and I was tested as low risk to side effects from SBRT at UCLA. Plus I like the UCLA institution, they were way more pro active, on the ball and communicative. It was the right choice for me. Everything is on track and my life is better than it was before treatment. I feel great and according to my doctor who is the chair of RO at UCLA I should not expect to have any side effects or reoccurrence. 90-95%. I’m happy I didn’t have to go for 39 days was definitely a factor but a bigger factor was I believe in the tech, being able to adjust the treatment on the fly and the gating and tracking of the MRLinac MRidian machine in which they can see all the soft tissues, colon bladder and prostate during the actual treatment. It was super easy (I didn’t need ADT) and it couldn’t possibly have gone better.

Dear Paulcalif,
I was in my late 60's when I had the 25 External Beam Radiation Treatments. I could have driven myself, but I was most grateful that my wife drove. The reason for that was due to all the water I was drinking everyday to make my bladder as large as possible to push tissue away from the radiation beam as much as possible. I literally was bursting out while in the car, going up the elevator, and rushing in to the waiting room, waving to the receptionists and thank goodness rushing into an empty restroom to use the facility. At the time, it, an empty restroom, was one of the most beautiful sights I could have imagined!!! The Technicians and Staff were very compassionate and said, "Don't worry about it, we clean up "spills" all the time." So I started bringing a bag with a change of clothes, a towel and wipes to run in with, just in case I had an accident or the restroom was in use. To date I am glad I filled up so much on water, I wish I had eaten more vegetables and kept my intestines and bowels cleaner with a little more "fasting" during that 25 day period of treatment. I hope your treatments go well, you drink lots of water and if you do have a "spill" your sense of humor carries you through to greater health and wellness. God Bless,

I totally enjoyed your comments along with a few others. My husband will be starting his Proton Beam therapy in the next few weeks. I gave him the information that you posted about having a change of clothing in the car. I'm visually impaired so I can't help him out with the driving. After reading your comments, I smiled for the first time since he was diagnosed. Thank you for that!

Elekta makes the Unity, another MR-Guided SBRT (MSK, for one, uses the Unity). Here is a good article on the technology with a bit of a side-by-side on the two machines: "MRI-LINAC: A transformative technology in radiation oncology" https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9911688/

I just got my PSMA PET/CT scan. No metastasis even though I had 2 cores 4+5, luckily.
Is there a benefit of proton therapy over MRdian 5 treatments in terms of the outcome and safety for my situation?
City of Hope Irvine has MRdian machine 10 miles from my house and UCLA is about 55 miles.
San Diego for Proton Treatment is 75miles .