Uterine Serous Carcinoma

Welcome, Giana, to the club no one wants to join! Thank you, No Time, for remembering me and bringing me back to this wonderful group. Giana, I used ice on my hands and feet, and I am so glad I did! I didn’t have booties or mitts- I used simple cold packs or bags of ice wrapped in kitchen towels and secured with rubber bands. I’m sure I looked a sight, but it worked! Take some extras in a small cooler, so if yours get warm you can swap out. Official ice gear is great if you have time to get it. You’ll only need to use it during the actual infusions and shortly after. It’s not hard to get used to as you’ll have warm blankets available for the rest of you. I had 100% success with icing. I will say that I didn’t know about it before my first chemo and had an allergic reaction to taxol which caused severe neuropathy in both hands and feet. My oncologist told me that acute onset neuropathy usually dissipates in a couple weeks, whereas the gradual onset neuropathy can be long term. I learned about icing in this group and six years later, I am still neuropathy and cancer free, praise God! I wish you the very best as you undergo treatment.

Hi Giana-

I am new to this board also but was diagnosed with UPSC in July and just finished my 6 rounds of taxol/carbo/keytruda. I am also 61.

I used cold therapy for my hands and feet and ordered the mitts and socks from Amazon. I do have some neuropathy in my hands and minimal with my feet so I do think it was worth it. My socks were better than the mitts I had because the hands did not stay as cold as long. I eventually bought some small flexible ice packs from Target that slipped into the gloves and socks which I really feel helped during the last couple of infusions to be able to refresh with new ice packs. We would pack a small cooler with all the ice packs. I would start using right before they started the chemo, I did not use during the pre-meds or Keytruda infusion. You will get cold so take a blanket with you and hopefully your infusion center will have heated blankets. You will need to take periodic breaks from the icing but it isn’t so bad. I would take a long nap and when I woke up we would change the ice packs.

Regarding headwear, I ordered some caps from an Etsy seller which are very comfortable to wear around the house and to sleep in. They are made out of bamboo or modal so are very soft. Now that it is colder, I have been wearing knit beanies and have a couple lined with fleece which are really nice.

I wish I had found this resource before I started treatment. Please ask if you have other questions.

I didn't know about icing when I did carbo/taxol for the first couple of treatments and developed brutally painful neuropathy in my hands. I iced for the remaining treatments, with the exception of one that was carboplatin only. That is when I developed horribly painful neuropathy in my feet. Carboplatin alone can also cause neuropathy, but it gets little attention because the taxane drugs are so well known for it. I iced for the first go around using the exact gloves that were used for the initial research that got so much play 4-5 years ago, and I believe that helped. When I recurred, though, I iced by holding plastic bags full of ice in my hands and immerseing my feet in ice water. It was so much simpler than freezing 12 of those heavy mitts and dragging two big ice chests to chemo, and I believe it was more effective, because my hands and feet got much colder. The first time around, the nurses were uniformly helpful with the mitts and booties, but had no ice. When I recurred a couple of years later, they had ice bags all ready to go because so many more people were icing. If you have developed chemo induced neuropathy or are concerned about it, you may want to talk with your care team about acupuncture. My doctor recommended it when I developed the same level of neuropathy after two chemo sessions that most people who get neuropthy (and not everyone does) have after six sessions. Between the ice bags and acuptuncture, I got through chemo the second time around without new permanent damage to my hands and feet.

Good luck.

Hey, it may not affect you, the neuropathy, that is. I only learned about the ice packs on this board which was after my chemo. The worst thing that happened was I felt like the bottoms of my feet were a little puffy and no issues with my hands. The puffiness with my feet went away a week after a chemo round but did tend to happen with each round. My main issue was my legs aching but that only began about three days after a treatment and lasted a few days. The best thing I found to help with the ache was propping up my legs in my recliner and putting heating pads on them. The ache wasn’t terrible more just annoying.

Army wife,

I am so happy to see your little avatar again! Glad to hear you are doing well. Thanks for coming back to let us know how you are doing.

Denise

So glad you found your way here. Let us know anyway we can help.

Hope you get better soon and able to resume chemo quickly. Ice is great, hope you found double pairs of good mits/boots u like and found a way to keep cold the second pairs. strongly recommend you use the L-GLUTAMINE powder that’s recommended by our doctors. After I started using, on top of my icing I think it made the critical difference; experienced no symptoms after the second cycle.

Hope the testing went well today