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[brittd]

Hello all!

I have been a lurker here since March 04. My Mom was dx with bc with mets to the lungs and liver at that time. Since she is not a computer person, I have been reading all the posts and filling her in on the things that I've learned here. Mom is 55 and this was her first dx with cancer of any sort. Here's a brief history of her dx and treatments so far:

March 04 - Found a lump under her arm, it was removed and found to be cancerous. The onc. did not detect bc from her mamo or the ultrasound but was 99% positive that bc was the primary. Only after an MRI was a tiny spot on the back wall of her breast detected and biopsied to determine bc primary. After her scans, a 8cm spot showed up on her liver and microscopic spots on her lungs. She was also told that she was Her2+ at that time.

April 04 - Mom is a patient at MD Anderson. They immediately started her on Taxol/Carbo/Herceptin combo.

June 04 - After three rounds of treatment, the spots on her lungs were gone and the spot on the liver had shrunk to 3.5cm.

Sept 04 - After four more rounds, her tumor markers were in normal range as was her liver function test. The spot on her liver had continued to shrink to 2.6cm.

Dec 04 - Mom has had two more rounds of her tx (which she gets every three weeks) and will have more scans in January to see where we should go from there.

She is two weeks behind in her tx because her blood counts were not high enough to get chemo. She has been tolerating her treatments extremely well, with only mild neuropathy and a few days on the couch after chemo. Do any of you have any suggestions on how to keep her counts up so she can remain on schedule if she has to do many more rounds of tx? Any information would be extremely helpful. Other than the low blood counts, Mom is doing very well. Her onc calls her his "star patient".

I Hope all of you have wonderful holidays. And Joe you're right, I promise to not only read, but also post on the forum from now on!

Take care,
Brittany

[al from canada]

Dear Brittany,
If is the White blood counts then Neupogen or Neulasta would do the trick and if it is the red cells then Eprex or Procrit.
Good luck,
Al

[Merridith]

Hi Brittany:

I was concerned about the same thing while I was in chemo. I did some research and I found studies that indicated that exercise (particularly impact exercise such as walking) increased people's ability to take chemo. Exercise stimulates the bones which manufactures blood cells.

I also made it a point to eat green leafy vegetables and red meat to make a natural source of iron available to the body. (Eating the pill concentrates can be difficult because it often causes stomach upset - it's sensitive enough due to the chemo!)

Good luck!
Merridith

[brittd]

Thank you Al for your response. Mom actually does get both of those shots. You can tell I'm new at this b/c I left out some important info in my post! A better question would be - is there anything in addition to these shots she could be doing? Or is there anything she might be doing wrong for them to be low? (for example, not resting enough, etc?) She is just really worried that her low blood counts have something to do with her cancer progressing. I'm trying to ease her mind a bit on that front as well.

Thank you again.

Brittany

[*_Sharon_*]

Hi Brittany, I hope your mom is doing OK. My nutritionist told me to eat as much protein as possible to help with blood counts. And that if I could not keep down a lot of food to make sure protein was my first priority.

I am also sorry to hear that your mom's low blood counts are making her worry. Please tell her this in case it helps ease her mind. I am a relatively young breast cancer patient (31) with no evidence of metastatic disease and my blood counts started out very strong at the beginning of my chemo. (I am also taking Neulasta). My oncology nurse warned me that I needed to be prepared for the fact that my blood counts were going to go down with the cumulative effects of chemotherapy and there was not a lot I could do about it. She said it was the natural progression of the chemo taking it's toll on my body and not an indicator of disease... I am in my third month of chemo and she was right. My counts are way down. And I just had a full pet/cat last week and everything is clear so it is not an indicator of disease. I hope that helps. I am very glad your mom is responding well to the Herceptin. I will say a prayer for her. She sounds like a very strong person!!

[Janelle]

Britney,
Your Mom is very lucky to have you in her corner.. she has her own personal angel looking out for her. Glad to see you posting and wish I could add some useful information. Knowledge is power and it really helps to make you feel in control and part of the 'team'.

I had recurrence to lungs and liver in March 03 .. went thru A/C and Taxotere.. which put me in the hospital twice.. went on Herceptin and was NED in March 04. My liver had been so full of tumors that they couldn't believe the results... it was a long struggle, but boy did it pay off in the long run. So, never ever let your Mom give up hope... that light in the tunnel may not be an oncoming train, but the end of the tunnel. I'm now treating brain mets.. and we are going to kick their butts to!

Hugs,
janelle

[Lolly]

Hi, Brittany, and Welcome! P-nut butter and cottage cheese helped me keep my counts up. If I made sure to snack once or twice between meals with p-nut butter on crackers or toast, and washed it down with a half cup of cottage cheese, my counts remained high enough to get full treatments. My nurses gave me this tip, and it really did help. I was surprised. Use a good natural p-nut butter, and fat-free cottage cheese.

Love, Lolly