rad onc - no LGlutamine or Amifostine or feeding tube recommended - your thoughts?

Scambuster said:

Have to listen to the Docs
Hi Suzzane,

I didn;t get to try Amifostine but did have to get the PEG in about week 3 as I was losing too much weight and couldn't really eat. I was weaker by that time but it is doable if he needs it by then.

On the L-Glutamine, it is an Amino Acid not an antioxidant so it should be OK but you will need to listen to the Docs. He should be OK to use it as a mouth rinse at the very least but it has been shown to prevent loss of muscle tissue loss, which is what will happen if he does lose a lot of weight. It has also been shown to actually increase the effectiveness of Chemo in some cases. If this will be the case I certainly can not say but you can take this passage along to the Doctors and see what they say. Unfortunately they may know little or nothing about it and hence err on the side of caution and exclude it.

Regds
Scam

"L- GLUTAMINE is an essential Amino Acid that : improves brain functioning, stabilizes blood sugar & decreases alcohol cravings, maintains health /functioning of the lining of the gut, important for muscle function & metabolism, helps with wound healing (esp the mucosa), helps maintain acid/alkaline balance, is critical in protein metabolism. Glutamine & Cancer : studies showed Glutamine enhanced the selectivity of antitumor drugs. It did so by helping to protect normal cells from the chemotherapy while making the tumor cells more sensitive to the chemo. Further, when Glutamine was given to patients undergoing abdominal or pelvic radiation therapy it protected the intestinal mucosa from injury, accelerated the healing of the radiated bowel & modulated the long term consequences of radiation. (Main purpose for me was to aid healing and stop mouth burning during and in the horrid period after treatment finishes).

Cancer and other diseases and injuries induce a state of physiologic stress that is characterized by glutamine deficiency. This deficiency is aggravated by chemotherapy and radiation therapy used to treat cancer. Therefore, glutamine is sometimes described as a conditionally essential amino acid that needs to be supplemented when the body is stressed.

Cancer-related glutamine deficiency can reduce the tolerance of normal tissues to cancer treatment, necessitating reduced doses and possibly diminishing the effects of treatment. Glutamine supplementation may help protect normal tissues from chemotherapy and radiation while sensitizing tumor cells to these agents.

Increasingly in the early 2000s, glutamine is considered an important component of both oral and parenteral (intravenous) nutrition (PN) therapy during high-dose chemotherapy and radiation treatment. It also is used as a nutritional supplement for bone marrow transplant (BMT) patients, particularly those with leukemia or lymphoma whose bone marrow has been destroyed with high-dose chemotherapy."

susan0803 said:

after talking with med onc - will go with it
We met with the med onc this week who was in favor of the tube. She gave Joe some convincing arguments and he is going to get the tube done now before treatments. Mostly because once treatments starts, scheduling getting it done will be harder and he will already be in pain from the rad, as people have mentioned here, so why add more to it. the med onc also said the glutamine was OK, so i think we are going to use that too.

joe will also be getting iv hydration too (the day of chemo, which is 3 times throughout the 7 weeks, and for 2 days after the chemo day). it seems they have thought of mostly everything, hopefully (cross fingers)

thanks again everybody - as always!
suzanne

Scambuster said:

PM
Hi Suzanne, I tried to PM you but was blocked. Have some info on alternative (plant based) nutrition for the PEG which got me through. Let me know if you need this as pretty much all the stuff you will get will be milked based protein (Casein).

Scam