Taxol & Herceptin

[al from Canada]

Lisa,

For some reason I lost sight of the fact that you are taking taxol and herceptin concurrently so during your taxol treatment, don't take more than 100 mg. of COQ10 / day. One dose in the morning is good. After finishing taxol I would bump it to 100 mg 2 x day. The reason for the reduced doseage is because COQ10 is a very powerful anti-oxidant and anti-oxidants are NOT recommended while taking chemo.

I have always considered it a calculated risk taking COQ10 with chemo because of its benefits. COQ10 is the ONLY FDA recognized natural suppliment that has medical benefits, as a cardio-protective therapy. The jury is still out on concurrent chemo + anti-oxidants but until the final tally is in, I would err on the side of caution.

The only documented chemo + anti-oxidant negative result I'm aware of is a study where administration of curcumin (tumeric extract) reduced the effectiveness of adriamycin on human subjects. On the otherhand, I had a conversation about this very thing with a naturopathic doctor and his view was that taking anti-oxidants with chemo is like trying to put out an atomic explosion (chemo) with water from a garden hose (anti-oxidants). And just to clarify, herceptin IS NOT chemo, it is a targetted biological therapy.

Sorry if I have confused you and ....... please give us your thoughts on this Becky.

Good luck again,

Al