Blood Clot

oldpaint03

My Husband finished chemo/radiation in Jan. and seemed to be doing great with a clear pet scan in april, then in july found that his neck was swelling on one side and had a cat scan and they found a bloodclot in his jugular vein. They say they dont know what caused it and put him on blood thinners which make him very dizzy and also his hand feels numb. I wonder if it could be caused by scar tissue from the rads? I know someone on here can help because I've never seen a question that somebody cant answer!! You guys are the best and have helped Jack and I more than you'll ever know. I wish we could meet each of you in person and give you all hugs!! Thanks a bunch,

Jonni

Hondo

Hi Jonni
I am very sorry to hear Jack had a blood clot so far out from treatment, a lot of times during Chemo treatment it happens. As with me I would get dehydrated a lot and sometime get problems but never had them after treatment stopped.

Hope someone else can help you better with your question then I did.

Take care
Hondo

waywest

Blood Clot
Hi Jonni,
My husband also had an embolism but it was in his carotid artery and unfortunately was not visible. You are very fortunate that they are treating it in time. My husband required 10 hours of surgery to repair it once it ruptured and had a stroke during surgery. I honestly don't know how the doctors can say they don't know what caused it. Our doctors were very clear that radiation had damaged the arterial walls. This happened about 4 months post treatment.
I am very happy to see that they caught it in time for your husband. I don't know much about blood thinners but do mention the side effects to your doctors. Hope all goes well.

Wendy

Hondo

waywest said:

Blood Clot
Hi Jonni,
My husband also had an embolism but it was in his carotid artery and unfortunately was not visible. You are very fortunate that they are treating it in time. My husband required 10 hours of surgery to repair it once it ruptured and had a stroke during surgery. I honestly don't know how the doctors can say they don't know what caused it. Our doctors were very clear that radiation had damaged the arterial walls. This happened about 4 months post treatment.
I am very happy to see that they caught it in time for your husband. I don't know much about blood thinners but do mention the side effects to your doctors. Hope all goes well.

Wendy

Hi Wendy
Amazing that your husband survived that ordeal how is he doing now. I have a lot of damage to the carotid artery on both sides of my neck due to the radiation treatment that I took twice to the same area. It mostly gives me problems with blood pressure being too high or too low but I have learned to live with it as we all do.

Thanks for sharing
Hondo

DrMary

Our doctor said chemo caused it
Doug had bilateral pulmonary embolisms (clots in both lungs) that probably started with a clot in his leg (he noticed the leg because it hurt, but had no problems with the lungs). The chemo doc said it was one of the possible side effects of cisplatin, possibly combined with lifestyle (flying for business). He said there was a danger of clots for at least 6 months after the last chemo treatment.

However, I think your question about radiation damage is relevant - Doug had old damage in his leg, which may be why the clots started there (and why it took a week to figure it out - he thought it was just a flare-up of the damage). We're pretty sure it was not caused by inactivity - Doug was still very active and had played hockey the night before they put him in the hospital for the clots.

About treatment - the two main options are warfarin (coumadin) which inhibits production of the clotting factor in your blood, and lovenox (low molecular weight heparin) which accelerates decomposition of the clotting factors. Coumadin is a pill, and it takes a few days to get up to working levels, so they often give lovenox for the first few days. They monitor effectiveness of coumadin by doing blood clotting tests - basically they want you to clot 3-5 times slower than normal. The big problem is that coumadin works by inhibiting vitamin K recycling; if your diet varies a lot in vitamin K, the effectiveness of the coumadin also goes up and down. For a chemo patient, who might not be able to eat regularly, this can be an issue (it was for us). Coumadin also takes at least 5 days to clear your system, so if you expect to have surgery, they prefer to have you switch to lovenox.

Lovenox is a daily shot, and it is not affected by your diet. It clears your system in about a day, which is why we continued it even after Doug could eat again, since he insisted on playing hockey. His doctor agreed that if he got hurt, they could keep him alive a day until the lovenox wore off (I also sent him with blood-clot accelerating bandages and asked him to warn his teammates - don't know if that happened).

Coumadin is considered to have fewer side effects, and the daily shots of lovenox can be a literal pain, so coumadin is likely the drug of choice if your diet is regular and you aren't playing contact sports. I'd suggest talking to your doctor about how long he should take the anti-clotting drugs - again, our chemo doctor wanted to treat for 6 months after the last chemo treatment, but your doctor might have a different protocol.

BTW, with both drugs, you should avoid aspirin, motrin and naproxen sodium, as they further inhibit clotting. Let the doctor know if you have symptoms of internal bleeding, like stomach pain, or dark stools.

buzz99

Blood Clot
The exact same thing happened to Buzz. Finished treatment in January, bloot clot showed up on the June scan. The oncologist seemed to think it was associated with the port. He is still on coumadin. Your hubby's numb hand may be due to the chemo. Buzz has numb fingers and toes from the Taxotere. I don't know if the blood thinner is causing the dizziness. Buzz is dizzy at times when he stands up but I think it is just due to "deconditioning" which means he is out of shape. Hope the symptoms go away soon and that your husband feels better. Karen