Negative Blood groups and Her-2 neu

[Gina]

Hello, Everybody,

Some of us have been curious about what at least appears to be a higher than expected frequency of folks with negative blood types who are also her-2 positive. If this is YOU...smile..I would love to hear your story either on the board..or for you shy ones...at my personal e-mail GPOPP@Comcast.net. I am A-, but would love to hear from anyone who is A- B- 0- or the most rare type AB- who knows for certain that they are also definitely her-2 positive.

Also, I just learned of a woman who has positive 0 blood who is ER-PR-her-2 +++ who carried a negative-blooded child to full term. As I was a negative -blooded woman who carried a positive- blooded child to full term, I am also interested in hearing from any of you who might possibly fall into these categories of being one blood type with a pregnancy involving your opposite blood type, i.e., negative blood woman carrying positive blood child or positive blood woman carrying negative blood child.

All this of course has to do with my interest in immunity factors and her-2. But what might it mean?? Well, hard to say...right now, it is just an interesting bit of trivia that has a frequency too high to be just "chance."

If you are not sure you are negative but had to have the Rhogam shot before giving birth, I want to hear from you as well as most likely you have negative blood. Also, if you are not sure, but remember discussing something about blood transfusions during your pregnancy, see if you can find out what type you are and let us all know. Could be interesting. Will share the data along with some of my uncanny conjectures...in future topics with us all. Godspeed to everybody and goodnite, Gina

[jojo]

Gina,

I know you are more interested in negative blood type as well as pregnancy with the opposite blood type. I happen to be not in your group, as I never was and never will be pregnant. But since I got her2 breast cancer, then I might as well say it here: I am O+, but my mother is O-; she carried me to full term. She doesn't have breast cancer, but did experience 2 benign cysts in her early 30's at separate times. I got cancer at age 35... I couldn't help but wonder if that would be an influencing factor in my cancer? Oh well, we will never know!

Good luck in your research, this is an interesting question!

[*_Christine MH_*]

O positive with an O positive mother. Could this be set up as a poll?

[Gina]

Christine first...did you have any pregnancies full term or not where a child with negative blood could have been involved???? Even miscarriaged or aborted, doesn't matter as long as there may have been a possibility for the opposite antibodies to developed with an opposing blood type fetus?? Or, has Jojo has mentioned, was your mother Rh negative??? Also, best guess...if NONE of these categories fity you, then, most likely, you are NOT ER-PR- Her-2+++ as I so far am more frequently noting this combo with the negative blood...just curious. I would love to set this up as a poll if enough folks might be interested but I don't know how to do that...would someone try to help me???--as if (she swoons) there is any HELP for me hee hee hee!!!! smile. Thanks!!

JoJo...thank you so much for bravely sharing. You have just created a NEW group that I had not thought about...so if any of the rest of you out there have mothers, especially Rh NEGATIVE blood mothers or mothers with opposite RH factor from you, please include yourselves, if interested, in the discussion. JoJo, was your mother's ancestory from the Basque area, eastern Europe or Ireland/Scotland??? just curious.

Again, the only reason I am looking into this is a much higher than expected number of women that I particularly know or work with who have her-2 (esp. with the ER- PR- tagline ) also have had actually A- blood. As Rh negative blood, in the general population, is not all that common, I have just been surprised to run into so much of it in my small sphere of contacts in this regard. I am A- with ER- PR- Her2+++ and gave birth to one child of A positive blood type. My mother and father were RH negative so my mother carried same blood type children and is alive and very active at almost 70 -with never a trace of cancer. Both my paternal and maternal grandmothers were RH negative and lived to 89 and 91, respectively, all giving birth to Rh negative blood children. I am of Hungarian/Scottish ancestory so negative blood runs on both my mother's and father's side, but I married a soccer player with Hispanic background from Honduras...A Positive blood, of course, and the blood type my only son also shares with his father. I got her-2 mediated breast cancer, as far as I know..., 6 years after giving birth to him. I did have the regular series of Rhogam shots. I will keep all interested posted. Thanks for sharing, GP

[*_Carol_*]

Gina
I too am A - never really thought about a connection
are there current studies being done on this ?
Carol

[Becky]

Hi Gina

You already know I am A- but my mom is A+ (she got BC too but at age 72 and is only ER/PR positive whereas I was 45 and ER/PR pos and Her 2 +++)

I have 3 A+ children and got the series of Rhogam with all three. My youngest (daughter) is 14 yrs old.

Becky

[jojo]

Hey everybody, I don't want to give a huge scare here, but I do know one fact from meeting many deaf people myself... I personally know of 2 deaf boys having been born with hearing loss (I notice typically milder), due to the Rh factor. I cannot remember which side had the Rh factor -- the boys or their mothers. I would bet that if the mothers had had received a shot for the Rh factor while pregnant, their sons would have not been deaf (or rather hard of hearing) to begin with. So, it is really important for the pregnant mother to have a shot at that, when suspected with the Rh factor. With that shot administered timely, the newborn would eventually not come out deaf.

[jojo]

Sorry, I forgot to answer Gina's question.

No, I am not from Eastern Europe, nor Ireland nor the Basque area. I am Macanese, a mixture of Chinese & Portuguese. More clearly, BOTH of my parents are Macanese -- this is not a case of having one parent being Portuguese, the other parent being Chinese. There are a couple of distinctive races, though -- my mother's mom was partly "white" Russian and Dutch (Macanese, too), and my father's mom was 100% Malay (from Malaysia). HIs dad was Macanese, as well as my grandfather on my mom's side.

Because of this ancestry: just by looking us... people keep guessing that myself & my dad are either Hawaiian or Filipino, whilst my older brother & mom look Japanese. Later, I learned that sometimes the Filipino can look similarly to the Malay. So, we also suspect maybe there is some Japanese in my mother's side. Apparently, I look like my dad, my brother like Mom.

As a 2nd afterthought, my onc DID ask during our first appointment, for our family ancestry, specifically right after my father was saying that he was known for having "small" white blood cells, and also after my mom was telling that my mom, my brother & myself have low blood pressure. There was one time when my brother was considered as "borderline anemia." When we told her about the family history, her face looked like in response: "Oh I know there's another reason why JoJo has cancer" but she didn't explain furthermore and we didn't think to ask her, since we were all very shell-shocked at the thought of my cancer diagnosis during that first appointment.

[jojo]

Again, sorry I don't mean to be hogging the boards! :-) Just wanted to mentioned that the Macanese come from a small port town called Macao (ma-cow) in China, I'd say about almost 2 hours to Hong Kong by ferry boat.

For many years, Hong Kong was a British colony & Macao a Portuguese colony. Just as Hong Kong was handed over to China from England only a few years ago, Macao was also handed over to China from Portugal, I think, in the same year (?). My family was sad at the hand over day! :-( Sniff - sniff - sniff. Then we really understood how the American Indians felt when their home land was yanked under their feet.

In truth, we feel more Portuguese than Chinese, hence our Catholic religion, European mannerisms (kisses on opposite sides of face, like the French & Italiana), etc. If anything by the Chinese culture, we were probably influenced in the aspect of education (like high work ethic).

[Lisa]

I'm A+.

Love and light,

Lisa

[Lisa]

I'm A+. Gina, where did you get your information about blood types possibly contributing to bc? I'm no expert, but this is the first I've heard of this.

Love and light,

Lisa

[jener8er]

Hi! I am Her2+++, O+ blood, and my last child (of 4) was O-... The Ped even mentioned it as being not common. I was diagnosed with invasive Breast Cancer when my youngest was 19months old. I'd be very interested to see if there is any correlation between these two things.
Jen

[Barbara H.]

Hi Gina,
My mother is A+, my father 0+
I am A-. My first daughter is A+. I did not have the shot until after she was born. My second daughter is A-. She also has autism. My third child, a boy, is A+.
I have Irish, English, German, and French ancestry.
I am interested what you learn from your research.
Thanks,
Barbara

[*_Julie_*]

I am O+ and my husband is AB+ and my two kids are A+ and B+. I am Her2+++ ER-,PR-.

[Sandy H.]

There is a very interesting book called Eat Right Four Your Type by Dr. Peter J. D'Adamo. A friend offered to give me the book to read (a thick book) said my body was like hers meaning we had the same allergies, chronic diseases etc. I laughed at her and she prceeded to tell me what was in the book. There is a section on each blood type. She copied the one for my blood type which was like hers. I was amazed and now I can tell what a person's blood type is by what they eat!!! My friends thinks its pretty amazing and I think it is. I can look at a person's plate and say is your blood type A positive and they will say it is if they know. Also it will tell the disease your body will be prone to by the blood type. The one good thing so far my friend does not have breast cancer that we know of. I hope you will read the book and I think you enjoy it as I did. You probably can get it used off the internet and save some money (it sells for about $25.00 hard cover) as it has been around for a while. Hugs, Sandy

[Marilyn]

I am A-, have A- parents, gave birth to two A+ children. Interesting to see how many are negative and what impact if any that might have.

[Sheila]

I am A+ and my mother who also has breast cancer is O+...I am Her2 3+ and she did not have the Her2 factor.
Hugs
Sheila

[Janet/FL]

I am A-
ER/PR -
Her2+++
No children.
Janet

[athena453]

Gina,
Wow, interesting. My blood type is O+, my mother is O-. My father is O+. I am the only one with bc in my immediate family. I also have two younger sisters who are O+ as well. I am hormone receptor negative.

I have finally gotten out of the chemo-induced fog for a bit. Started taxotere, carboplatin and herceptin Thursday. I will be emailing you some questions I have.
AM

[*_IRENE FROM TAMPA_*]

Hi Gina -

I found your posting interesting -

I found out that my blood type is O negative when I had my first child in 1967. My husband had O positive. The combo of the two meant possible problems if child had the oposite of me. Luckily she had my type. When I had my second child 2 years later, she was O positive which made me a candiate for the hemogloblin injection. Lucky for me they had just come out with it. I had the injections (at that time it was given within 24 hours after birth) I know they do it differently now. My third child was also O positive and she had no problems.

I do not know if there is a connection - I am also ER negative.

Irene

[ViSchorpp]

I'm A+

[Gina]

Well, Ladies,

MANY, MANY thanks to all who have responded. What it all means I am not sure, but I wanted to add this tidbit of history to the board to let you all ponder it. The general theory is that Rh negative blood originated in the Basque area long, long, long ago and eventually diffused outwards to certain parts of Europe. As you know, the native Basque language is NOT related to any other language on earth...so the language and the heredity of this group is one of the most rare and least understood of human origins.

Q17. Are the Basques genetically different from other Europeans?

A17. Apparently, yes. It has long been known that the Basques have the highest proportion of rhesus-negative blood in Europe (25%), and one of the highest percentages of type-O blood (55%). Recently, however, the geneticist Luiga Luca Cavalli-Sforza has completed a gene map of the peoples of Europe, and he finds the Basques to be strikingly different from their neighbors. The genetic boundary between Basques and non-Basques is very sharp on the Spanish side. On the French side, the boundary is more diffuse: it shades off gradually toward the Garonne in the north. These findings are entirely in agreement with what we know of the history of the language.

Q18. Does this mean the Basques are directly descended from the earliest known human inhabitants of Europe, the Cro-Magnon people who occupied western Europe around 35,000 years ago?

A18. Nobody knows. This is possible, but we have no real evidence either way. The only evidence we have is negative: the archeologists can find no evidence for any sudden change in population in the area for thousands of years before the arrival of the Celts and later the Romans in the first millennium BC. --cut and pasted from http://goeurope.about.com/cs/basque/l/bl_basque_map.htm

It is also possible this type may some how be interconnected with the Neandertal species of homo sapien, but this is still pure speculation although there is some research called the theory of "the wave" that may support it. Physical traits possibly related would be widow's peak, large head, having to give birth by c-section as baby's head too large to pass through birth canal, a baby born with unusually mature neck muscles, can move own neck to nurse first time, a person with heavy thicker/ shorter bones, and or a memory that functions differently, more like a database retrival system with cognitive associative recall, traits of autism and asperger syndrome traits, the ability to perceive thoughts and happenings at a distance without need for direct exchange of what is considered normal communication, astigmatism, and possibly red hair...although this is known to have entered the British Isle's from the Vikings, but where did it originate???

I have two ROUGH hypotheses that I am examining with this question: One is that if a mother gives birth to a child of opposite positive OR negative status from herself, some changes may take place in hers and or the baby's immune system that could cause the system not to recognize cancer in a way similarly to how the immune system does not recognize a different neg or pos child, if it did, and as happens sometimes, the immune system would try to kill the child, or if the childs opposite blood mixes with the mothers and she is negative, the mother would be in danger and this is why those of us who have negative blood with positive children of a certain age were given the Rhogam shot, although as Irene from Tampa so aptly points out, this option was not available until the late 60s. That is the first thing I am researching. Of course the Rhogam shot has been implemented in so many things, about like vaccines, but again, it IS interesting to note, even from our small sampling here, that in cases where both the mother and the daughter have breast cancer, the older mother (except for Tom's) is usually her-2 negative while the younger daughter, perhaps born in the late 60's is her-2 positive. It is also interesting to note that usually her-2 is striking young women...I was 33, I saw at least one case on the board that was 29, many of us are now 40 something to 50 something...having either been born in or lived through the 60's...hmmmm...intriguing.

The second sort of exciting hypothesis is that all of us who are her-2 +++
may share some sort of common ancestory going WAY, WAY back to origins of modern homo sapiens. Meaning the her-2 connection is perhaps not as immuno related as it is heredity. If you read the part above about 25% of all Basque folks having Rh negative and a whopping 55% having type O, what we at least surmise is the oldest blood type, and then you read these postings we have here under just this board..you will see that that of those who did respond, even the one's who were not themselves negative blooded, had a mother or a child who was opposite of them. And almost all had some connection to a negative blooded family member.

This is very interesting. I will continue to pursue it as a hobby more than actual serious research as time permits, although I do think we may all learn in the end that we are indeed united, if not as true "sisters" , perhaps as very distant cousins..smile. Her-2 has seemed connected with so many less than happy things, wouldn't it be great if we found out something very unusual and special about what this might mean on a larger scale??? Talk to any her-2 friends you know and encourage them to post their types here. I would love to find a negative B blooded person with her-2, if one exists anywhere out there??? Also, FYI, type A blood, in general, whether negative or positive, is most frequently associated with cancer of all types for all kinds of folks...Best Regards and thanks again to all who posted. Gina

[sarah]

another negative blood type! Rh A- (negative) Her2+++ ER+ PR+
Sarah