tumors/herceptin

I'm curious to know how many are on Herceptin only and NOT NED. In other words, who still has tumors, but is not receiving chemo. My sister was wondering how long she would stay on chemo. Do you think she could stop chemo and take only Herceptin to keep the cancer from spreading more? At this point she's been on Taxol/Herceptin for almost 6 months. This combo has managed to stop the spread, though there is still much of her liver diseased, as well as bones, brain and spots on spleen and kidney (which may be gone by now.) Doctor want to switch her to Navelbine/Herceptin at the end of the month due to neuropathy. Any thoughts on this would be SO appreciated.

Hi there, yep, keep going, the Navelbine and Herceptin are a good combination, I looked in my search engine a couple of years back and typed in "drug resistant tumours" and Navbelbine came up so it seems that her treatment has stalled at the moment and something else is needed to kick start it again, as for the neuropathy I can sympathise there, I have had 18 weekly doses of the Taxol and it is driving me crazy but I have to get to the magic number of 26 and see how I am then.

I am presently only on Herceptin weekly and zomeda once every 4 weeks. My last PET in August showed hot spots in my spine, pelvis and ribs. All the areas in my liver and pluera and lymph were gone. My onc. stopped my chemo at that point (taxotere, carbo). My tumor markers were finally within the normal range except for CEA which got down to 6 from 3150 in February of '04. I have been doing just Herceptin for 9 weeks now and the CEA is now at 11.
I feel pretty good and am willing to keep on just the Herceptin for a while longer before going to something else (it will be Navelbine). It's a quality of life issue.
Cathy

I'm with Lynn, keep going with chemo.
el

I'd say go with the Navelbine/herceptin. In 8 months on that combo, my bone mets has gone NED, and my liver tumors are more than 50% gone, with the remaining ones significantly smaller.

It's been a great combo for me, might do the same for her!

I was happy to read your replies...thank you. I do think she will continue with chemo for awhile longer. I am hoping that Navelbine will get rid of some of the tumors, although we are very happy that she responded well to the Taxol, as it truly was "touch and go" a few months back.