New Caregiver Here with questions...

CornellDeville
CornellDeville Member Posts: 14 Member
edited December 2023 in Breast Cancer #1

My wife of 51 years was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2019 and underwent a lumpectomy and mastectomy. Since then her care team has been trying to keep it under control with various treatments. We started with Anastrazole and after that we went to Ibrance. About a year after that, she developed some round nodules on her chest where the mastectomy was done and her oncologist told her the cancer had metastasized to her skin. So she went through 10 radiation session in that area. It left her with no nodules and a very healthy looking skin. (However, there was a short time we had to use dressings on it because of the radiation burns.)

To make a long story short, after about a year, the Ibrance stopped working and the doctor recommended Faslodex (fulvestrant) injections. She has had two sessions with 2 injections each time, and the skin nodules are multiplying since she doesn't have anything like the Ibrance controlling it. And I have read that the Faslodex takes at least 3 months to "kick in".

The doctor also got an insurance approval for Kisqali, which supposedly works successfully with the Faslodex and Letrozole. Here comes the question (finally)... Is it accurate to assume that the Faslodex does take that long to work, and has anyone else had success with the Kisqali. Are there other options we're not considering?

Thanks so much for any input.

Comments

  • JenniferHart
    JenniferHart Member Posts: 2 Member
    #2

    Hi! I just replied to your other comment and didn’t see this one.

    in 2020 my mom had a deep flap mastectomy for ER+ Her2-BC. About a year later she also developed nodules in the incision line on the skin. They also found a small spot on the other breast and she began taking Falsodex. She was 61 at the time. She also had started PIQray which gave her pancreatitis. In looking at her tumor markers.. they initially went up after 1 month and didn’t start going down until the 4-5th month after taking Falsodex. They went down steadily for the last year while the other breast shrank and had a shriveling affect. Doctors don’t know if it’s scar tissue or comprised skin. TM just staring going up and it’s been 1.5 years.

    Just did a MRI, waiting on results.

    curious is anyone else has had this happen or similar situation that can help us?!!!

  • dunngreg
    dunngreg Member Posts: 1 *
    #3
    https://csn.cancer.org/discussion/327310/new-caregiver-here-with-questions

    My wifes been on Kisquali for just about a year (which is about the time she got diagnosed with stage 4 bone cancer which happened about the same time when her breast cancer spread after that situation had been ok for several years). So far so good with the Kisquali re: no sign of the dire side effects that are warned about and it seems to be performing as a blocker during the last year. Of course, every person and condition will be different. How long and how effective this Kisquali will be can not be definitively determined. Doctor mentioned something about 3 to 5 years at which time he indicated that another medication work around would be tried. So in that sense we are in the same boat as you considering various med treatments. Hope it works out for you and keep us updated and I hope that this was of some assistance

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