Hey Steph and any others on Zometa

[tricia keegan]

Kim, I had to get clearance from my dentist too and just get one iv infusion once a year for Osteopenia, after three treatments my bones are showing great improvement already. I was told only the first infusion would bring flu like symptoms and this proved to be true for me and hope you do well on it too.

[StephN]

Hello Kim & everyone -

My bones have shown some continual slight degeneration at femoral neck, and Zometa seemed worth a try to arrest that. I have been taking my calcium and D3 with some positive result, but even with a good diet some areas continue a slow decline for my age matched numbers. Right now my lower lumbar spine is noted on my last CT scan. This is the area where I had a surgery on L4 two years ago.

I will be very interested to see the report from my next bone screening after 3 every-6-month Zometa infustions.

Ellie - interesting you bring up long term Herceptin and whether that may have an effect on our bones. I think I will pose that question to my oncologist. She does have a special interest in bones. I never thought of that as a possibility and not sure how the science could support that theory.

[StephN]

Just got a reply to my query on whether Herceptin could have a negative effect of our bones.

My oncologist says:

"Herceptin has no effect on bones. You took zometa to try to prevent bone recurrence. But you can get too much zometa in your bones and that can paradoxially lead to fracture (even though it's a bone strengtheing drug, too much exposure leads to diusrupted bione formation that doesn't have any "cushion" effect when you fall)."

Perhaps Sassy had other risk factors for her fractures? Any falls or jumping up and down? But here is the answer to how Zometa can have a negative effect - disrupts BIONE formation. Something else to look up!

How much bione do we have? Is the amount different in each of us? What else affects bione? Etc., etc ...