Mom is half way through her chemotherapy treatment!!! Today was a very long day, but thankfully, it went much more smoothly than Mom's first treatment 3 weeks ago. I got to the Moll Center (at Fairview Hospital) at 9am. Mom was just finished with get her blood drawn as I arrived. We then had to wait nearly an hour to meet with her oncologist, Dr. Bagai. He met with us for maybe 10 minutes max. I walked him through a list of mom's side effects, which looks quite intensive, but actually are the normal side effects that occur with the two chemotherapy drugs that she is on. He also talked about the extreme reaction to the taxotere that Mom had during the first treatment. He said that the infusion of the drug will be even slower this time and Mom would get an additional dose of a steroid to help against any allergic reactions as well. Dr. Bagai said that she could be more fatigued with this treatment. So, we have to make sure that she stays as active as possible. Naps are fine, but walking, going out and about, etc are even more important.
Mom had received a list of supplemental vitamins from her chiropractor. I asked Dr. Bagai about using the supplemental treatment, but he said that these supplemental drugs could cause an adverse reaction to the chemotherapy drugs and that the drugs are not FDA approved. He doesn't mind Mom having the chiropractic treatment, but not any additional supplements.
After meeting with the doctor we headed to the chemotherapy lab for the rest of our day's adventure. Mom was started on her pre-medications (steroids, anti-nausea, pepcid and benadryl). These medications take nearly an hour to go drip. Finally at nearly noon, Mom got her taxotere. We (including her nurse) were all watching for any of the immediate side effects. Thankfully, with the drip being so slow, her body was able to absorb the drug. No immediate side effects!! Mom was on the taxotere drip for 3 hours. When Mom got her lunch, Dad and I went out for lunch. We got back and still had a good hour to go on the taxotere. That finally finished and then Mom got her cytoxan.. This is a 1 hour drip what doesn't have immediate side effects. We left the chemotherapy lab at 4:30pm.
Long day. Mom was very tired, but wired at the same time. The steroids make you restless and unable to sleep. However, I really hope that Mom can get some sleep tonight. She needs to get some rest. Tomorrow, we go to Fairview Hospital to get her neulasta shot. Then, we start the side effect cycle all over again.
Sitting in the Chemotherapy Lab for 6 hours is quite an eye opening experience. You see people in all different stages of their treatments; some with cancer, some with other diseases that need to have special infusion treatments. Mom doesn't bring books or things to do while she is on treatment because she really likes to take in everything that is going on around her. She will strike up conversations with other patients or the nurses. For example, she was asking another patient about the hat that she was wearing to cover her chemotherapy bald head and compared their types of cancers. The nurses do their best to make everyone as comfortable as possible during their treatments while running around the lab. They really are a great bunch of people.
I'm so happy that treatment #2 is done. Two more treatments to go! The next treatment is April 16th and the final one will be on May 7th.
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