Jeanne: Thanks for your reply. There is so much to learn isn't there?
Not just about the cancer but about living as well from all this. My Mom's
adenocarcinoma cells were found in her liver. I'm hoping they are able to
find the primary tumor soon. She was diagnosed in August 1999 and just
finished her 3rd round of chemo. First was 5FU and Leucovorin and most
recently Gemzar only. The cancer is frozen the doc said... not spreading
but not shrinking. he also said her liver felt like it was somewhat
smaller so we have recieved some hopeful news. So far the mets seems to
just be to the liver and they aren't sure about her hepatular lymph node.
they said it's irregularity could be due to the involvement of the liver.
I will keep you in my thoughts and prayers. Joy
At 06:09 PM 12/15/99 -0800, you wrote:
>Hi, Joy, a pleural effusion is where fluid begins collecting between the
>lining of the lung (pleura) and the diaphragm. Normally the lung sticks
>to the diaphragm. This compresses the lung and you get short of breath.
>They drained about 2 liters of fluid and found adenocarcinoma cells in
>the fluid. Then they put in "talc" (similar to talcium powder) to stick
>the layers back together. Apparently, it is very rare to find the
>primary for this diagnosis but it can happen and then they can do the
>proper treatment for the cancer. eg, breast, lung, ovarian.
>
>
>Best to you and your mom, Jeanne
>http://cancernet.nci.nih.gov/clinpdq/detection/Tumor_Markers.html
>
>Tumor markers are specific for different cancers. Not 100% reliable, as
>infection can throw off the CA125 marker for instance but this is used
>as an indication of ovarian primary. Mostly tumor markers are taken
>during treatment to see if the treatment is working or if there has bee
>a rrecurrence.
>
>Joy Ann Reckley wrote:
>>
>> Hi Jeanne: My mother has the same diagnosis as you do and the cancer cells
>> showed up in her liver but still is unknown primary. What is pleural
>> effusion? Thx and god Bless. Joy
>>
>> At 10:04 AM 12/15/99 -0800, you wrote:
>> >This is going to seem weird. One of my first cousins who is also a
>> >Registered Nurse (ICU) is being treated for breast cancer. She is
>> >receiving chemo and when her WBC count went down too far to continue,she
>> >told me that she took echinacea (sp) tincture and got her wbc up and
>> >then went on neupogen. ???? Might be worth a try.
>> >
>> >I have adenocarcinoma unknown primary, pleural effusion treated with
>> >talc (dec 97) and nothing else to date. Now my tumor marker ca125 is up
>> >past normal but taking the month off worrying while waiting for the
>> >results of a recent biopsy. God bless, Jeanne
>> >
>> >BesTom@AOL.COM wrote:
>> >>
>> >> Hello everyone. I wonder if any of you have had similar experiences to
>> what
>> >> my husband is going through now. He has Stage IV NSCLC with treated
>> pleural
>> >> effusion. He had five rounds of taxol/carbo and had to stop due to
>> >> neuropathy. He missed 10 days of the new chemo due to Thanksgiving. On
>> >> November 29 he had his first round of a new chemo-- gezmar/carbo.
This was
>> >> supposed to be given on a weekly basis but when we went back the next
week
>> >> his WBC counts were too low-2 (normal starts at 4) to resume chemo. Our
>> onc
>> >> is willing to give him neupogen but now his platelet counts are too
low--66
>> >> as opposed to 150. The neupogen will not help that. He is reluctant to
>> give
>> >> him interleukin-12 to raise the platelets due to its toxic nature so
we are
>> >> waiting for his counts to come up. The WBC was back to 3 this week.
I am
>> >> very worried because next week will be four weeks he hasn't had
>> treatment and
>> >> we are terrified of mets to the brain or bone.
>> >> Has anyone has this kind of experience and do you know of anything to
raise
>> >> the platelet count? I have heard conflicting advice about platelet
>> >> transfusions--that the platelets have to come back naturally. Any
>> advice or
>> >> personal experience in this area would be much appreciated.
>> >> Best wishes and thanks to you all. Love, Bess
>> >> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> >> This is an automatically-generated notice. If you'd like to be removed
>> >> from the mailing list, please visit the Medicine-On-Line Discussion
Forum
>> >> at <http://www.meds.com/con_faq.html>, or send an email message to:
>> >> majordomo@lists.meds.com
>> >> with the subject line blank and the body of the message containing the
>> line:
>> >> unsubscribe mol-cancer your-email-address
>> >> where the phrase your-email-address is replaced with your actual email
>> >> address.
>> >> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> >------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> >This is an automatically-generated notice. If you'd like to be removed
>> >from the mailing list, please visit the Medicine-On-Line Discussion Forum
>> >at <http://www.meds.com/con_faq.html>, or send an email message to:
>> >majordomo@lists.meds.com
>> >with the subject line blank and the body of the message containing the
line:
>> >unsubscribe mol-cancer your-email-address
>> >where the phrase your-email-address is replaced with your actual email
>> >address.
>> >------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> >
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> This is an automatically-generated notice. If you'd like to be removed
>> from the mailing list, please visit the Medicine-On-Line Discussion Forum
>> at <http://www.meds.com/con_faq.html>, or send an email message to:
>> majordomo@lists.meds.com
>> with the subject line blank and the body of the message containing the
line:
>> unsubscribe mol-cancer your-email-address
>> where the phrase your-email-address is replaced with your actual email
>> address.
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>------------------------------------------------------------------------
>This is an automatically-generated notice. If you'd like to be removed
>from the mailing list, please visit the Medicine-On-Line Discussion Forum
>at <http://www.meds.com/con_faq.html>, or send an email message to:
>majordomo@lists.meds.com
>with the subject line blank and the body of the message containing the line:
>unsubscribe mol-cancer your-email-address
>where the phrase your-email-address is replaced with your actual email
>address.
>------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is an automatically-generated notice. If you'd like to be removed
from the mailing list, please visit the Medicine-On-Line Discussion Forum
at <http://www.meds.com/con_faq.html>, or send an email message to:
majordomo@lists.meds.com
with the subject line blank and the body of the message containing the line:
unsubscribe mol-cancer your-email-address
where the phrase your-email-address is replaced with your actual email
address.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
