Starting Interferon Treatment - Opinions Please - Port or PICC?

yalleh said:

PORT
If you havent done it yet and you have the option the PORT is the way to go. I had the PICC for my Interferon and its a pain in the behind, my cancer got worse and so for the following treatments I had a PORT installed and its awesome. If you have a lot of pets to take care of,,, then it will be very hard for you to keep the PICC clean. Just IMHO .

PORT vs PICC
Hey y'all. I thought I'd let everyone know - I opted for the port. I just finished week 3 of the 4 week high-dose interferon treatment, and I can honestly say the port was definitely the way to go.

I go in on Monday, my oncology nurse "taps" my port - that "tap" stays in until Friday, and is removed after treatment is completed for the week. Since the port is on my chest, it is out of the way. Once you get used to it you forget the thing is even there (it took me about 3 days to get over the idea, and that's only because I'm squeamish about needles).

Other opinions I heard after the fact - my oncologist (who was thrilled I chose the port - and impressed I had done the research and come to the decision without any consultation with him at all), all the oncology nurses I've spoken to, and all the nurses in the blood lab all agreed that a port is the best way to go. It makes their lives/jobs a lot easier in the long run. And hey, I'm all for making the medical folks happy - if they're happy, then they are happier to make me happy :-) (Better living through pharmaceuticals, etc.) So far, they've kept me as happy as can be expected on interferon.

(BTW - Sorry for the overly long post again. I frequently get diarrhea of the fingers when typing.)

Other pluses:
1) They can draw blood labs from it each month. I'll make sure that monthly blood draw coincides with the monthly hep-lock that needs to be applied to the port. Kill two birds with one stone (actually three, 'cause I can get by B12 shot on the same day, but that's a separate issue ;-) )

2) Because they can only draw blood from one arm, being able to use the port during the next year instead of the veins in my one good arm means that at the end of the year, I may actually still have some good veins in that arm. Without the port, there's a really good chance even my good veins would be shot by the end of a year of blood tests.

3) This is a "negative" plus in the sense that it involves negative thinking on my part. (I believe you should think positively, but think realistically as well.) Should something bad happen in the next year - meaning we find some additional mets - I'll already have the port in place. So in one sense, I'll feel like I'm already one step ahead in whatever my new treatment plan would be. (At that point, you gotta take the positives wherever you can find them.)

So, IMHO, if your insurance company will allow it/pay for it, you should really seriously consider a port. It's awesome.

PS - Ladies, if you do get a port, do yourselves a huge favor. Unfortunately, many, many surgeons like to put the port inside the bra strap - I guess they think they're hiding it for us. What it really does is make it somsewhat uncomfortable when the "tap" is in.

So, the day of surgery, take a Sharpie permanent marker, and on the side where the port will be implanted, trace the outline of your bra on your chest. Add an arrow and a little note "port -> side" or something like that (initial it). Then, when the surgeon comes to talk to you the day of surgery, show and tell s/he what you have done and why and request they put the port OUTSIDE the bra!

(Yes, I know a Sharpie is a permanenet marker - that means when they're scrubbing your chest for surgery, they can't scrub the marker away, which means they cannot ignore what you have written there!)