Endometrioid Adenocarcinoma, Moderate to poorly differentiated cells, (FICO Grade III)."

hopeful and optimistic

I generally post at the prostate cancer forum, but now I am very worried, and have lots of those negative feelings. 

My friend has just been diagnosed with

" Endometrioid Adenocarcinoma, Moderate to poorly differentiated cells, (FICO Grade III)."

She has scheduled an appointment with an Oncologist

Please, what does this mean; how serious?

What treatments are available?

What are the new state of the art diagnostic tests and/or treatments that are available.

Any tips for treatments

Are there any support groups in Olahoma City

Anything thoughts or comments.

Thank you

 

 

Nellasing

Hi Hopeful,

Glad you are here trying to be a good support to your friend.  Feel free to click on my name which will take you to my "About me Page" I was dx April 4, 2016, with Edometrial Adenocarcinoma (endometroid type) which turned after surgery/pathology to be Grade IIIa, Stage 3.  I begain chemo therapy- taxol/carbo in June and ended Sept. 21, 2016.  I did not go on to radiation but that was my choice. 

I also chose to use a naturopathic Dr., acupuncturist and many other "alternative" complementary treatments such as IV therapy and supplements etc. etc. along side the chemo as an integrative approach to keep my healthy body healthy while the chemo took care of the cancer.

There are many threads and wonderfully smart ladies here who will no doubt be able to answer all your questions and I hope you or possibly your friend will feel free to come here for support as you begin this journey.

All my best to you and your friend.  Please let us know how things go. 

NoTimeForCancer

I am so glad Nellasing was

I am so glad Nellasing was able to respond as one of the warriors with this particular type.  

Grade 3 is an agressive type and I think pretty much all of us with Grade 3 (regardless of Stage) have had a minimum of chemo (usually Carbo and Taxol) and may also have external and brachytherapy radiation.  Most of have gone to gynecologic oncologists as they have taken additional training for cancer of the female reproduction areas and are real specialists.

Some of the women have mentioned a Facebook page for uterine cancer but I don't FB.  This page has a wonderful group of women - and if your friend has questions she would be welcomed with open arms.  As a friend - you are welcome as well to come and ask questions too. 

MAbound

Hi Hopeful

This is a great forum with tons of information that isn't that organized to find, unfortunately. About all you can do is start reading backwards and you'll find a lot of helpful information. It's a lot, I know, but the more you or your friend learns the more empowered you'll both feel. We are all unique in what we are dealing with and with what we bring to the table, so remember just because you read about something happening to one or more persons here, doesn't mean that it happens to us all. It's a complicated cancer with many variables and different options for treatment.

Given that you don't identify the stage, I suspect that your friend has been diagnosed from a biopsy at this point. The next step would be some type of surgery to remove visible cancer and test other tissues to determine stage. Treatment can't be determined until after that point and usually won't start until after one has had a chance to recover from the surgery a bit. 

The important thing to do at this point is to take a big breath and not get ahead of oneself with worrying. This cancer, even a grade III, (I'm stage 3c, grade III) is not a death sentence. My gyn oncologist gave me a treatment plan for a cure as opposed to one for palliation. It's a battle, so one needs to prepare for it mentally as well as physically. It takes months to a year or more to get through it. And even then, there's all of the followup appointments and testing to watch out for any recurrences. It's not fun, but it is doable. Use the time waiting from one step to the next to learn all that you can. If nothing else, it will help you and your friend to think of questions before you go to appointments rather than after.

Put those negative feelings aside. Your friend is very blessed to have you there for her and you should feel very good about that.

 

Double Whammy

Well, hello

You gave me your sage wisdom when my husband was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2013.  He continues to do well, as do I, a survivor of both breast and endometrial cancer since 2010.  Grade III endometrial cancer is a high grade and is indeed taken very seriously (mine was Grade 1, the "good kind").  There is much wisdom amongst this group of women, most of whom have Grade III cancers.  They will be very helpful.  Please encourage your friend to join as there are some pretty smart wise women here.  I hope she does well.

Suzanne

hopeful and optimistic

Ladies,  Thank you for

Ladies,  Thank you for providing this helpful information, which I will share with my friend when she is ready. Hopefully she will want to post here. 

Suzanne, I  remember you posting at the prostate forum on behalf of your husband. I'm glad that the both of you are doing well. 

.................................

Note: these cancers are a real bummer.

hopeful and optimistic

Images

I wonder, other than a CT scan are there other images that are more effective to determine mets in this case,  ie. MRI or a PET scan?

Nellasing

I had a PET and MRI

right after I was diagnosed in April 2016 I had both just before surgery on the 28th.   Hope things are going ok.

hopeful and optimistic

Nellasing said:

I had a PET and MRI

right after I was diagnosed in April 2016 I had both just before surgery on the 28th.   Hope things are going ok.

Thanks for the information

What are the side effects from sugery; if there are mets, can surgery be avoided by having radiation and hormone and/or chemo?

Also if known, what are the side effects from radiation? Are there different types of radiation that are available?

Thanks

 

Kvdyson

hopeful and optimistic said:

Images

I wonder, other than a CT scan are there other images that are more effective to determine mets in this case,  ie. MRI or a PET scan?

I recently had a PET scan for

I recently had a PET scan for the first time and found out that the dye that they inject (and then track) indicates whether an organ is working as expected or, if there is extra metabolic activity, whether there could be cancer cells lurking in the organ. The CT scan provides them with an indication of the size and structure of an organ so they can determine whether anything looks out of place. Hope this helps! Kim

Soup52

Yes, there are a couple types

Yes, there are a couple types of radiation both internal and external and some variation on how those are done also. If you look at the thread ladies going through radiation you will read a lot of info.

Soup52

Sorry I got cut off. External

Sorry I got cut off. External you could have some hair loss in the area and burns on the skin though I had no problems with burns. Also because of the area where the radiation is given you could have stomach issues such as constipation and diarea. I've had constipation and continue to have it. Radiation is cummulatI've and keeps working for weeks after it is done. You may also be tired with the radiation usually more so as the weeks of radiation continue. I've also had internal radiatoon. There are a couple different ways this can be given. I am not going to get into that one yet. I suggest you check that thread first.

hopeful and optimistic

Soup52 said:

Sorry I got cut off. External

Sorry I got cut off. External you could have some hair loss in the area and burns on the skin though I had no problems with burns. Also because of the area where the radiation is given you could have stomach issues such as constipation and diarea. I've had constipation and continue to have it. Radiation is cummulatI've and keeps working for weeks after it is done. You may also be tired with the radiation usually more so as the weeks of radiation continue. I've also had internal radiatoon. There are a couple different ways this can be given. I am not going to get into that one yet. I suggest you check that thread first.

Thanks for the information

I'm having a problem finding the thread. 

Can you let me know the date of the thread, or send the link

Thanks

 

Soup52

Ok, I was wrong about the

Ok, I was wrong about the name of the thread. If you just type in radiation in the search you will find many different threads. If you click on last you will find more recent ones. You will find that some people are against radiation because of possible long term effects. I did both kinds because I wanted to improve my chances of survival. There are so many factors to consider, your stage andvgrade and type of cell involvement. Internal radiation is referred to as brachytherapY. I hope this helps.

MAbound

hopeful and optimistic said:

Thanks for the information

What are the side effects from sugery; if there are mets, can surgery be avoided by having radiation and hormone and/or chemo?

Also if known, what are the side effects from radiation? Are there different types of radiation that are available?

Thanks

 

One Step at a Time

As you may be realizing, there is a lot of ground to cover in the learning process after getting a diagnosis for this cancer. It can be overwhelming and pretty scary when you start reading. I would caution you to focus your attention on each step as you go because there will be a lot of information that you will read that can be frightening if you try to cover all of the "what ifs" before you have actual facts to narrow what you research.

Zero in on preparing for the first step at this point so you can prepare for what kind of questions your friend will want to ask her gynecologic oncologist (I'm presuming that you've already done research on who to go to in your area). That first step is going to most likely be some type of hysterectomy, so you'd want to understand the different ways it's done and why in case that would raise any questions before proceeding. The impact on hospitalization and recovery for DaVinci (robot) surgery is a lot different than for abdominal hysterectomy. 

Until she gets the actual pathology report back after her surgery, there's really no way to know what her treatment plan is going to be, so it would only be frustrating to query the oncologist about that at this point because he couldn't give any answers that wouldn't be subject to change after the pathology report is finalized.

You realize that chemo and radiation are possibilities, though, so go ahead and read through the threads here to get some helpful tips on dealing with what seem to be almost universally experienced side effects: fatigue, constipation, hair loss, neuropathy, and poor appetite. I wish I had known about cold therapy to prevent neuropathy and hair loss prior to chemo, so definetely look into that, so she can be prepared if need be. 

There's a good thread that really helped me a lot when I was facing radiation called "Still terrified" (node 305795) where a lot of ladies helped me while I wrestled with that decision. Chemo is a systemic treatment, whereas radiation is local, so a lot of us question whether or not we really need to put ourselves through that and the risks it creates for later on down the road when theoretically there's really no cancer there for them to aim at. Please remember, though, that right now is probably a bit premature to be worrying about this, because there's a good chance that it might not be part of your friend's treatment plan. Save looking into it for when/if you know it is.

I hope this helps. Remember, you don't have to learn it all now, we'll be here to help you both with anything that comes up as things progress.

 

 

TeddyandBears_Mom

hopeful and optimistic said:

Thanks for the information

I'm having a problem finding the thread. 

Can you let me know the date of the thread, or send the link

Thanks

 

There are a couple of threads

There are a couple of threads that may answer many of your questions:

'Ladies going through chemo'

'Let's talk about radiation'

Nellasing

MAbound said:

One Step at a Time

As you may be realizing, there is a lot of ground to cover in the learning process after getting a diagnosis for this cancer. It can be overwhelming and pretty scary when you start reading. I would caution you to focus your attention on each step as you go because there will be a lot of information that you will read that can be frightening if you try to cover all of the "what ifs" before you have actual facts to narrow what you research.

Zero in on preparing for the first step at this point so you can prepare for what kind of questions your friend will want to ask her gynecologic oncologist (I'm presuming that you've already done research on who to go to in your area). That first step is going to most likely be some type of hysterectomy, so you'd want to understand the different ways it's done and why in case that would raise any questions before proceeding. The impact on hospitalization and recovery for DaVinci (robot) surgery is a lot different than for abdominal hysterectomy. 

Until she gets the actual pathology report back after her surgery, there's really no way to know what her treatment plan is going to be, so it would only be frustrating to query the oncologist about that at this point because he couldn't give any answers that wouldn't be subject to change after the pathology report is finalized.

You realize that chemo and radiation are possibilities, though, so go ahead and read through the threads here to get some helpful tips on dealing with what seem to be almost universally experienced side effects: fatigue, constipation, hair loss, neuropathy, and poor appetite. I wish I had known about cold therapy to prevent neuropathy and hair loss prior to chemo, so definetely look into that, so she can be prepared if need be. 

There's a good thread that really helped me a lot when I was facing radiation called "Still terrified" (node 305795) where a lot of ladies helped me while I wrestled with that decision. Chemo is a systemic treatment, whereas radiation is local, so a lot of us question whether or not we really need to put ourselves through that and the risks it creates for later on down the road when theoretically there's really no cancer there for them to aim at. Please remember, though, that right now is probably a bit premature to be worrying about this, because there's a good chance that it might not be part of your friend's treatment plan. Save looking into it for when/if you know it is.

I hope this helps. Remember, you don't have to learn it all now, we'll be here to help you both with anything that comes up as things progress.

 

 

YOU are amazing

I was hoping you'd reply- you are just so full of wisdom and you express it so well!  I'm so relieved to have all you amazing "sisters" to do this journey with!  Blessings and (((HUGS)))

MAbound

Nellasing said:

YOU are amazing

I was hoping you'd reply- you are just so full of wisdom and you express it so well!  I'm so relieved to have all you amazing "sisters" to do this journey with!  Blessings and (((HUGS)))

It's all here

Thank you for the complement! I think the strength of this forum is the diversity of what we all have to offer each other: experience, positive attitude, calm, knowledge, humor, encouragement, empathy, etc.  It's all here and ready for whatever anyone needs. I'm very grateful for what I've recieved here and very happy to pay it forward.

hopeful and optimistic

Thanks for the information, and direction to the links

still terrified

https://csn.cancer.org/comment/1556702#comment-1556702

 

Need advice on starting chemo/

Ladies going through chemo -

 

http://csn.cancer.org/node/304886

 

 

 

Let's talk about radiation

http://csn.cancer.org/node/296985

 

Some things to digest and think about.

 

I wonder if anyone has had experience with, or knows about SBRT (ie cyberknife, novalis, etc delivery systems) .

 

Thanks

H

 

 

or 

beccabtown

What an impressive group of women we have!

I just read through this thread for the first time and want to say how impressed I am by all the responses. What an amazing group of intelligent, well-informed, compassionate women! I'm so glad to have you all.