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Old 08-28-2012, 05:15 AM   #26
rhondalea
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Join Date: Jun 2011
Location: Somerset, NJ
Posts: 487
Re: I couldn't make this up if I tried

Maybe this will help:

http://www.globalrph.com/trastuzumab.htm

"Reconstitution: Reconstitute each 440 mg vial of Herceptin with 20 mL of Bacteriostatic Water for Injection (BWFI), USP, containing 1.1% benzyl alcohol as a preservative to yield a multi-dose solution containing 21 mg/mL trastuzumab. In patients with known hypersensitivity to benzyl alcohol, reconstitute with 20 mL of Sterile Water for Injection (SWFI) without preservative to yield a single use solution."

It should be noted that benzyl alcohol is a neurotoxin. (All kinds of nifty results pop up if you google it with that as an additional search term.) Here's one link that doesn't give me the feeling of high credibility generally (the site has an obvious bias), but it has sources listed at the end (three good links, one possibly broken).

http://chemicaloftheday.squarespace....l-alcohol.html

This really makes me wonder if chemo brain is caused by the chemo drugs, or if those of us who have been impaired have actually been damaged by the other stuff they slip us when we're not looking.
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4/14/11 Core needle biopsy: negative for cancer
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7/19/11 Biweekly dd AC w/Neulasta; done 8/30/11
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7/11/13 Aricept 5mg for cognitive impairment; increased to 10mg as of 8/23/13; back to 5mg 12/2013
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