Pancreatic Cancer

jcandler said:

Non Whipple?
PurpleCancer,

I am not sure what a non whipple is, but I had a whipple done 3/05. To this day, I experience pain in my stomach/colon. I have lost all sensation of hunger and also when I am full. My oncologist believes this is a result of my radiation/chemotherapy treatments. There doesn't seem to be anything that can be done about it. The level of pain varies. Sometimes I am in pain for hours and other times just for a short time. I do have some pain medication for the more severe times, but normally I try not to take anything. I am not sure if this is normal or not since I have never met anyone else who has survived this disease. I will gladly answer any questions I can based on my experiences, since I know it is hard to find out the right information.

jcandler said:

Whipple
I also have pain after eating at times. My problem stems from not having any sensation of hunger. Due to this, I have no ideal of when I am full. What I try to do is limit how much I eat at one time. There have been times that I knew I was eating too much and was going to pay for it, but the food was so good, I said what the heck. The only food item I know that will cause me problems is chocolate. I can only eat about 1 1/2 of the snack bars at a time. As for all other types of food, some times I have no problem and other times the same food will make me sick. The doctors believe this is because of the radiation treatment, chemtherapy and surgery. They have bascially told me there isn't anything they can really do. I was fortunate not to have any swelling. My surgery was 4 years ago and I still have problems from it.

jcandler said:

Whipple
I also have pain after eating at times. My problem stems from not having any sensation of hunger. Due to this, I have no ideal of when I am full. What I try to do is limit how much I eat at one time. There have been times that I knew I was eating too much and was going to pay for it, but the food was so good, I said what the heck. The only food item I know that will cause me problems is chocolate. I can only eat about 1 1/2 of the snack bars at a time. As for all other types of food, some times I have no problem and other times the same food will make me sick. The doctors believe this is because of the radiation treatment, chemtherapy and surgery. They have bascially told me there isn't anything they can really do. I was fortunate not to have any swelling. My surgery was 4 years ago and I still have problems from it.

PURPLECANCER said:

Pain and swelling
I had the non-whippple. Basically it is a replumbing. They removed my gall bladder and ran tubes directly from the pancreas and liver to my duodenum (upper small intestine). Whipple was not possible because my tumor had attached itself to the blod vessles that pass through it. That was done in May '08 and took 20 staples to close up. I still have some pain every day, some days are mild and some are real bears. I take 60 mgs of slow release morphine 2 or 3 times per day and can boost it with liquid morphine or hydrocodone if things get hairy but I haven't done that for months. I didn't have a lot of swelling but it seemed like forever until my guts settled in and untangled so I could have semi-normal bowel movements. That's what I blamed my hard stomach and back pain on, backed up bowels. I still take the generic Mirulax laxative every 3 to 4 days and it helps me alot. I don't know exactly what those surgeons do while we are "under" but I felt like a punching bag. After surgery I had about 17 radiation sessions and some chemo. At that point my CA19-9 counts went from 2000+ down to 78 (cool, huh?). Now, unfortunately, they are going up again. I'm told my only option is whether or not to take more chemo. Chemo makes me feel much worse than the cancer so I don't know what to do. I also take vitamin B-6 every day...several people have told me it's good for the immune system (it can't hurt and it's cheap!)

fergiefive said:

my husband
My husband seems to be following the same road as your husband. If you are still reading here, and you don't mind I would like to know how your husband has progressed. My husband was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer March 09. Initially, borderline resectable Stage III which quickly moved to Stage IV with metastisis (even with chemo). Now liver met has grown to 7 cm, just had to get 3 pints of blood on Tuesday due to weakness and low red blood cell oount. Sound familiar? We have tried 3 different kinds of chemo. Nothing has helped a bit. Did you ever find anything that helped (medically speaking)?

JTMueller said:

Appetite
Hello there,

First off, to all out there that are fighting Pancreatic Cancer, my heart goes out to you. My father has Stage 4 Pancreatic cancer, and is undergoing chemotherapy right now. He's been doing that for about six months. We'll find out soon where the tumor is. About six week ago they had done a scan, and things had at least been neutralized.

The biggest problem is we can't get him to eat much of anything. I know the loss of appetite is one of the side effects, and he has tremendous stomach pain sometimes. But some days he will eat NOTHING for a large chunk of hours. We have a hard time getting him to eat, and that only zaps his strength. Does anyone out there have suggestions how to motivate him here? We're at our wits end.

lorir1104 said:

Hi there,
My dad was recently diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer as well (in April). Luckily, it hasn't spread anywhere but due to the location of the tumor and the fact that it's wrapped itself around the main blood supply, it's inoperable at this time.

He signed up for a clinical trial, which was basically more agressive radiation treatment along with chemo. He did really well through the treatment (5 weeks of radiation every day, plus weekly chemo), but about a week after he finished, he got pretty sick. He drank a lot of Ensure to keep his strength up. He had NO appetite at all. He also said that when he eats, sometimes the pain is worse - which makes him not want to eat.

First off, I think your dad needs to get his pain under control. Mine takes an extended release morphine tablet (12 hour), then has fast acting morphine pills to take for breakthrough pain. They can also give your dad meds to help stimulate his appetite as well as enzymes to help with processing the food. My dad was recently put on these because of the horrible gas (burping), and they think it's because the pancreas isn't producing enough enzymes.

Make the call to the doctor and see what they have to say. Best wishes to you and your family as you go through this. It's so hard to watch the ones you love suffer. My heart goes out to you.