Mother (78 years) diagnosed with colon cancer - chemo or no chemo - help!

sks

All,

My 78 year old mother has been diagnosed with colon cancer.  the doctors say it is in the sigmoid region.  the CT scans also revealed multiple tumors (5) on the liver.  The doctors say it is a stage IV cancer.  they have placed a stent in her sigmoidal region.

Although the cancer is so advanced she never complained of any pain before.  she was recently hospitalized due to severe vomitting and discomfort and that is when we discovered the cancer.  Doctors are suggesting chemotherapy.  is it safe for her to undergo this ?  after the stent has been placed, she is fit as a fiddle and is going about her work as normal. 

I am really lost.  Any suggestions or guidance from other members of this forum will be greatly appreciated.

thanks

Sunil

Woodytele

Definitely discuss with your Oncologist

He should be able to suggest solutions to help.  The chemo for everyone is a battle, but it may take the pain away quickly as it did for me. 

Trubrit

The facts and intuition

Everyone is different in how they apporach their condition when first diagnosed. I personally wanted to know the facts. The stats. I wanted to know what my chances of survival were, and I wanted to know if Chemo was just going to give me a little bit of time, or possible years. Then, I had to make a decision based on those answers, and that was down to my gut, my instincts. 

I did not want to undergo chemo and radiation if it was just going to give me a few months or so.  As it was, I had the basic prognosis of five years with or without mets.  

I don't know how your mother faces her diagnosis.  Some people do not want to know the stats. Do not want to know how long they have left.  So, it is a very personal decision, and like Woody said in her reply, your mum should definitely discuss it with the Oncologist, and of course, with you, as you are obviously a loving daughter, seeking information. 

Of course stats can be beat. five months, five years, can be beat. That is why you (your mum) go with your gut feeling.

Like your mother, I also had no symptoms, or very few and they were unrecognisable. Only after diagnosis I got to thinking 'I wonder.....' Even with my liver met. In fact, I was feeling healthier than I'd ever done since my childhood.  That's Cancer for you.

I wish your mother the best of luck.  With a loving daughter, and family surrounding her, she will face whatever and probably do whatever it takes. 

We're here for you on the forum.  

Tru

JanJan63

I'm sorry to hear about your

I'm sorry to hear about your mom. It's different for everyone so nobody can give you a clear answer. I had radiation and chemo before my surgery and it gave me terrible fatigue but a few weeks later that was gone and it wasn't a big deal. Later, I had follow up chemo after the surgery and I was really on the fence about doing it. I chose to get it because if I hadn't and it had come back or spread Id have been kicking myself and I felt that I owed it to my family to give it my best fighting chance.

The follow up chemo gave me a blood clot to the lung and I almost died. It's rare but it can happen and my oncologist let me down because I'd had a few blood clots in my leg and she had just told me to take Aspirin for them. So there was a warning. I ended up in the hospital and so didn't complete my last few chemo treatments. Then, over a year later I developed metastices in my left lung. And now I'm being treated for them. Here's my point. If they'd have happened after I'd chsoen not to do chemo I'd be a huge chemo advocate and be angry with myself for not doing it. But, I did do the chemo, at least most of it. Howevere I did do it all and I was late getting started on it because of some issues after my surgery. So did the mets start because of the late start on the chemo and not finishing it? The other question is did the mets start because of the trauma of having the blood clot in that lung? That's the only place they are, in the lung that had the blood clot. I'm told they were having to suction out that ling with tubes and were rough, I even had a tooth damaged because of it. So did the trauma cause the mets to develop there? In other words, if I hadn't had the chemo would I have the mets because the chemo and hence the blood clot caused the mets?

Cancer is a very difficult thing to predict. there is no way to know what it's going to do and what course of action is best. The doctors look at the stats and decide from there but we are all different and one treatemtn may not work for someone else. Or a treatment they think isn't going to help much but is a last resort works wonderfully. Sadly, nobody can tell you the best course of action. Some people have great response to thinga that others have little response to. And whatever treatment the oncologist you're dealing with will be their first choice. My current onc is a chemo doctor. I'd like to explore options for my mets besides chemo but she keeps going back to that. I had them radiated last year and it seemed to work but then one started growing. I'm told radiation isn't an option now but I don;t know why not. It was the easiest of all the treatments I went through.

Anyway, I hope for the best for your mom. This is a hard thing and there are no easy answers and mostly you just have to have faith in your doctor.

Take care,

Jan  

abrub

People react diiferently to chemo

Some have more severe side effects than others.  My family knows I won't do chemo again; it impacted my quality of life and was of questionable benefit for my stage 4 appendix cancer.  However, there is no reason your mom can't stay chemo and if the side effects are too severe she can stop.  She also needs to think long and hard about her preferences of quality vs quantity of life, and needs to be up front with her drs regarding her priorities. My dr is on board with my decision to forego treatments that might possibly prevent my cancer from recurring (untried treatments for appendix cancer ) because we know that the likely side effects of the specialized radiation treatments are not worth the remote possibility of cure.  Get as much information as possible to make aneducated decision.

lizard44

It really is different for everyone

as  several people have noted,  there are many things to consider. My stage 4 colorectal cancer with liver mets was diagnosed at age 70. I don't know if your mother's age and how that might affect her reaction to chemo is one of your  concerns, and there isn't a great deal of literaure out there on  treatment of   the elderly because not that many studies have included people over 70, but that is begining to change. In my case, I opted to go with chemo, then chemo/radiation, followed by an ablation to get rid of the liver tumor, and am now  on  maintenanc chemo to prevent a recurrence. My oncologist  said she   was reluctant to use the word "cure" with stage  4 cancer but  felt confident that the cancer  could be managed much like any other chronic  medical condition, and she felt that treatment  would give me  at least a couple more years to enjoy life. So far I've enjoyed two years with a good quality of life, non-debilitating side effects that have been manageable, and I've been able to remain active. 

Do  learn as much as you can and make a note of any questions you have, then  discuss   the pros and cons with the oncologist and  have your mother voice any questions or concerns she has.  As others have said, if she  decides to go ahead with the treatment and it becomes too difficult for her, she could stop treatment knowing that  at least she had given it a try. I found this article in Scientific American on cnacer treatment in the elderly: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/never-too-old-to-fight-cancer/

Whatever you, your mother and the doctors decide, I wish you both the best.

Grace/lizard44

 

sks

thanks for all the support

I whole heartedly wish to thank the members of this forum for your valuable guidance.

Special thanks to Grace.  I looked at the article in scientific american and did a little more research and found the original journal article.

dug deeper and found the survey in mycarg.org, answered the survey questions and found out that my mom lies in the low risk area (score of 4).

Hence, as a family we have decided to go ahead with the chemo.  had a meeting with the onco.  she mentioned that my mom will be put on oxalyplatin and a mono clonal antibody immunotherapy. 

Hope and pray all goes well.  thanks for all your wishes.

 

JanJan63

Prayers for your mom! I hope

Prayers for your mom! I hope she flies through this without any difficulties. Sadly, now you're having to do what so many of us have which is to be well informed about cancer. Before I had it I believed lots of things that are just not true. And I never realized how complicated it is. I was always wondering why they can't find the cure for cancer without realizing how hard it's going to be and that there likely won't be a single cure because cancers are all so dfferent. I didn't before that there were different kinds of chemo. I thought it was just one product.

You sound like a great advocate for your mom. best of luck to her!

Hugs,

Jan