Need Your Inputs

I wasn't triple negative but
I wasn't triple negative but did have a large tumor. 6cm and another 3cm. I had 4 cycles of A/C before surgery and it did shrink it so my stage 3a became stage 2. Since I still had two nodes with cancer I needed 4 more cycles of Taxotere after surgery. And radiation. So the A/C didn't work entirely but helped. This won't help you but thought you'd like to know that someone else had a large tumor also.

P.S. You might try searching for triple negative and pull up old posts. Mimivac has posted a lot of threads about triple negative. I think there was one with a lot of info and I was going to bump it up but didn't find it.

Wife is stage 4 TNBC
I can tell you that my wife had the same questions, and it was always the same double edge sword, radiation for the back pain from the cancer in her spine or chemo to try and reduce the tumors in the other areas in her body. Some times it was radiation, becuase the pain was too intense and pain medication was not helping, in fact pain meds were too strong and she slept most of the day. Radiation oncologist and new oncolgist suggested that we start new chemo and monitor the progression and see if the areas in the spine will be reduced along with the other areas (Lung, liver, spleen and chest).
My wife has gone through TAC, which did reduce the area on her right breast from 9cm to 1cm, but it came back in her spine (T9 and now L1-3). She did the Doxil along with Avastin and no luck. PARP inhibitor trial, mixed results, but no luck. Now that we switched her oncologist with a breast cancer specialist, vice the general oncologist, the new onc has started my wife on Ixempra and Carbo platins along with Avastin and Zometa. So far the tumor marker has gone down and the blood transfusion helped with the anemia. My wife is always on the internet looking for new clinical trials and new types of treatments. Rexin-G was one of the new ones, but the trial was already full. If you would like, I can have my wife elaborate more if this was not helpful. Good luck and praying for you.

Thomas

RE said:

so personal
PDV it is such a personal decision, I grew up with cancer as my mom got it when she was 40 as did I and one of my sister's. For me it has always been whatever will keep me here longer with quality of life. I have had a lumpectomy on the left side and mastectomy on the right (should have had mastect. on left too but didn't now its too late). I have had 16 weeks of rads which I believe has given me the 11 years I have had since. Talk to your onco get a good feeling for what they think will best benefit you and your situation, ta,e someone with you as you may not hear everything as we tend to get over loaded. You may even ask your onco to write it down for you. Let us know how it goes, sending prayers your way.

RE

chemo/radiation improves you chance of survival by 50%
according to my doctors. So if you can do it, go for it, but if it did NOT affect your tumor before the surgery maybe it is not the same for you. This is something you need to talk over with your doctor and make an individual decision. Let us know what you decide. And good luck, God bless.