@What_Exit: And ice cream, too. And whatever the hell other treats you want.
Good luck! I have a prostatectomy scheduled for 11/4, had option of radiation, but doctor said with my (young-for-this-at-50) age, long-term prospects are best with surgery, so off I go. Not looking forward to the 25% chance or whatever of impotence but, hey, it’s been a good run.
Treatments start tomorrow afternoon. 5 treatments over 2 weeks and one status check with the Doctor. It will be a busy 2 weeks. Thankfully the drive is only about 11 minutes each way and the times are all when the Parkway should have fairly light traffic. I already had a Dental Cleaning and Bloodwork scheduled, so extra busy with medical related stuff.
I’m a little nervous, but nothing too bad. I will probably be better after tomorrow when I actually get through the first one.
@pulykamell, good luck with your operation. I keep hearing that it is among the most routine surgeries at least. Do they put you under, or just go with local anesthesia? I’m not sure what I would prefer, probably under.
Multiple tests including a Pet scan, MRI and biopsy, have found a very small tumor in my T5 vertebrae that has resulted from my prostate cancer of 7 years ago. It will be treated later this month with two shots of SBRT*, which is very powerful, highly focused and has a good track record of nipping this kind of tumor in the bud. Thankfully, it has spread nowhere else. I’m apprehensive because there are some risks involved, but I’m hopeful that this procedure will give me several more years of perpendicularity.
Has anyone else had SBRT treatment? I’m interested in your experience with it and what side effects you may have had.
*Stereotactic Body Radiation Therapy
totally understandable! update us after the first time is done.
I have a friend who has red flag test numbers every single year. They’ve always checked further, including biopsies, but he has been fine. This is not uncommon, and you may very well be one of those people. Have you had a biopsie?
Yes, biopsy was done and showed cancer. Two MRIs and two CT Scans also. In fact, treatments start tomorrow.
Best wishes. Not knowing exactly what will happen is always a little unsettling.
Darn! I’m confident you will weather the storm and reach full recovery!
@What_Exit, I hope your treatment is successful and has as few side effects as possible.
Same to @pulykamell.
I didn’t have SBRT but I did have hormone blockade and prostate irradiation (20 sessions) so I’m personally familiar with those side effects. I’m also a retired primary care physician, and note that the common side effects of such focused dosing to a thoracic vertebra lesion commonly results in skin irritation, general malaise, and local musculo-skeletal pain. It can also result in some inflammation of the lung and lung lining adjacent to the area, which could cause a dry cough and pains with inspiration. Likewise, it can irritate nearby bowel and cause some cramping and/or loose stools. Longer term complications can also include pathological fracture of the vertebra.
From my prostate radiation, I did have a ton of GI side effects, mainly radiation proctitis (unlikely in your case), bladder spasticity (also unlikely for you) and radiation-induced sacral insufficiency fractures (which did actually resolve with time and exercise and needed no extra treatment).
I am curious, what was your original treatment for your prostate cancer? And did your PSA jump up and lead to your evaluation for metastases? Or were you having local pain? Feel free to answer by PM if you prefer, or not answer that at all if you don’t care to.
Good luck! Hoping for easy sessions with no side effects.
First Treatment wasn’t bad, but they were backed up about 50 minutes and had told me to arrive with a full bladder. By the time the treatment was done, I really needed the bathroom.
I’m waiting to see if there are any after effects later in the day.
Yay!
There may be some delayed effects, but still, you are off to a good start.
Excellent! Here’s hoping we can get rid of the word first, and keep with the “Treatment wasn’t bad” for the rest of the time.
2 of 5 treatments done. So far just feeling a little wiped for the rest of the day, but not the next day. So not too bad.
Yay! !
Congrats on an easy start.
I’ve never done radiation therapy. My late wife had several courses of it for her initial cancer and then for subsequent mets over a few years. As a general matter each treatment was successful in stopping any further growth of the targeted tumor. So a total success for the narrow definition of local success. The problem in her case was the micro-mets elsewhere had already occurred and eventually the game of whack-a-mole had too many moles to keep up with the whacking.
Relevant to where you are with a single solid tumor and no mets, her reaction was generally that the fatigue immediately following each treatment was gently cumulative, that by the end of each treatment course it wasn’t debilitating, but was akin to an ordinary cold or flu where you were just listless for a few days, and that it began resolving just a few days after treatment ended. Otherwise treatments were real easy to take; fatigue and little else.
Good luck. I’m betting you’ll find this a major PITA and little more.
My husband may get radiation to the tumor on his backbone, if there is concern it might impinge on his spinal cord. That won’t do anything for the main illness, it would just be to address that one local tumor.
Much nicer to have only a local tumor!