Fertility After Colon Cancer Treatment
Fertility After Colon Cancer Treatment
I know that colon cancer is a cancer that affects people that are well over their reproductive ages. However I know that there is an increasing number of young people being diagnosed with this type of cancer. My question is for anyone who has undergone chemo treatments for colon cancer, and has either been successful in concieving, or has not been successful. If you were successful, how long did it take? Any complications? If anyone can respond, I would appreciate it. Thanks!
-
Guest
Hi Blanca. I have been really worried about that for a while too. When I ask my doctor, all he can say is, "Let me look into that for you." Unfortuntely, he never seems to find an answer. The good news is, I did the surgery and chemo (5-FU & Lecovorin) over 5 years ago and can happily report that I just recently found out that I am pregnant. I wasn't exactly trying, but it didn't take very long either.
I have heard of people having some complications, but I'm starting to think those were some rare circumstances. Ha. I'm laughing as i write this, since all of us on this board are rare circumstances. Did you have colon or rectal cancer. I had colon, but it's my understanding that with rectal there may be more adhesions in that area.
I'll probably start keeping a journal, for this reason exactly. So many young women who are getting colon cancer don't know what to expect as far as pregnancy goes, and I haven't been able to find any studies, either.
Good luck!
I have heard of people having some complications, but I'm starting to think those were some rare circumstances. Ha. I'm laughing as i write this, since all of us on this board are rare circumstances. Did you have colon or rectal cancer. I had colon, but it's my understanding that with rectal there may be more adhesions in that area.
I'll probably start keeping a journal, for this reason exactly. So many young women who are getting colon cancer don't know what to expect as far as pregnancy goes, and I haven't been able to find any studies, either.
Good luck!
-
Tammy Figg
Hi,
I had a baby 7 months ago, and went through Chemo and radiation. I had to do IVF, we harvested eggs prior to starting treatment as I am now sterile. What made me sterile is the radiation. I had Stage III rectal cancer. From what I know chemo can cause problems but the risk is low, it's the radiation that poses problems. If you have had abdominal surgery however, you will have scar bands and that should be watched carfeully probably be seeing a high risk doctor as a young lady from the 2005 Colondar had an experience with the baby/utuerus affecting the scar tissue from her surgery from Colon Cancer.
I would be happy to answer any other questions as well, you can reach me on our website at www.figgtree.com.
I had a baby 7 months ago, and went through Chemo and radiation. I had to do IVF, we harvested eggs prior to starting treatment as I am now sterile. What made me sterile is the radiation. I had Stage III rectal cancer. From what I know chemo can cause problems but the risk is low, it's the radiation that poses problems. If you have had abdominal surgery however, you will have scar bands and that should be watched carfeully probably be seeing a high risk doctor as a young lady from the 2005 Colondar had an experience with the baby/utuerus affecting the scar tissue from her surgery from Colon Cancer.
I would be happy to answer any other questions as well, you can reach me on our website at www.figgtree.com.
-
suzannchili
- Posts: 15
- Joined: Wed Jan 04, 2006 1:10 pm
- Location: Austin, TX
Bouncing Baby Boy
Blanca,
I had 7 mos. of 5FU and CPT11. I had a baby boy in the summer of 2004, 3 years after my last treatment. I was able to conceive right away. He weighed 11 pounds 9.6 ounces at birth, but they all swore it had nothing to do with my past chemo. Ha ha. Good luck yo you! Stay well.
suzannchili
I had 7 mos. of 5FU and CPT11. I had a baby boy in the summer of 2004, 3 years after my last treatment. I was able to conceive right away. He weighed 11 pounds 9.6 ounces at birth, but they all swore it had nothing to do with my past chemo. Ha ha. Good luck yo you! Stay well.
suzannchili
Well when I asked my doctor about it he also told me the radiation causes more damage than the chemo. I was going to harvest my eggs but I know someone who works in that field and the chances of an ovum being usuable is very low. Unless they are fertilized by sperm right away, and then the embryo is frozen. I was also told about removing my ovaries and then putting them back after all the treatment, but I was told that didn't guarantee my uterus wouldn't be damaged. I have two kids already, but I just want to know how damaged this is going to leave me. And I guess I won't know until after I am done.
yea, the radiation is what does it....
my personal concern is not for fertility after, i just would like to NOT be menopausal after.
I'm gonna try to have my right ovarie clipped up and out of the way (as i understand it, my left one is too close to the colon?? eh..whatever)
It's not a guarantee that i won't still go into menopause, but i guess it's worth a shot.
i really really really really don't want menopause.
although if they told me i'd be menopausal but i wouldn't have to have my entire colon removed and a bag in place, i'd take it.
damn i wish we got some choices in this once in a while
so, whats the consensus, has anyone had their ovaries clipped up and then after radiation weren't in menopause (people who are younger...as i'm 25)
my personal concern is not for fertility after, i just would like to NOT be menopausal after.
I'm gonna try to have my right ovarie clipped up and out of the way (as i understand it, my left one is too close to the colon?? eh..whatever)
It's not a guarantee that i won't still go into menopause, but i guess it's worth a shot.
i really really really really don't want menopause.
although if they told me i'd be menopausal but i wouldn't have to have my entire colon removed and a bag in place, i'd take it.
damn i wish we got some choices in this once in a while
so, whats the consensus, has anyone had their ovaries clipped up and then after radiation weren't in menopause (people who are younger...as i'm 25)
-
Molly
- Site Admin
- Posts: 440
- Joined: Wed Aug 31, 2005 7:57 pm
- Location: Glens Falls, New York
- Contact:
Oddly enough, this was in my paper this morning. I've heard of people having surgery to "pin up the goods," but have also heard of it not working. If you're planning to do something like that, research, research, research. Find a doc who's already done a zillion of these surgeries...and been successful.
By LAURAN NEERGAARD
Associated Press
Published on 5/9/2006
WASHINGTON -- A week before Carrie Lintner began radiation treatment for her cancer, doctors cut tiny holes in her abdomen and pushed her ovaries out of the way of the damaging beams.
The little-known, half-hour procedure saved her ability to have a baby, but the Michigan woman learned about it by chance.
When treating cancer in young women and men, doctors too seldom warn that some of the treatments that may save their lives may also destroy their fertility -- but there are options that offer the chance of future children, if patients act in time.
"You do need to think about it before treatment, or else it will be too late," cautions Dr. Stephanie Lee of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle.
New guidelines urge the nation's cancer doctors to tell younger patients if their pending therapy puts them at risk of infertility -- and quickly refer those who want to preserve that fertility to a reproductive specialist for help.
About 10 percent of the nation's 10 million cancer survivors were diagnosed during their reproductive years, and roughly 55,000 Americans under age 35 are diagnosed each year.
The risk of infertility depends on the type of cancer and treatment. Numerous forms of chemotherapy, high-dose body-wide radiation or radiation aimed at the pelvis, and even some surgeries can leave patients unable to procreate.
Surveys suggest only about half of oncologists properly discuss the fertility risk, possibly because their focus is more on helping patients survive than on how they'll spend their life-after-cancer years. Also complicating fertility preservation is that it can cost thousands of dollars, only sometimes covered by insurance, and typically is offered only at specialized centers.
Yet studies suggest that retaining fertility is a key goal of many patients, and doctors won't know that unless they ask, stresses Lee, who led a probe of the issue for the American Society for Clinical Oncology.
What's available to help? Most successful are sperm banking for men, and for women, freezing embryos; ovarian-moving surgery; and for cervical cancer, surgery that spares the uterus, conclude ASCO's new guidelines.
There are other experimental options, such as freezing and later reimplanting ovarian tissue -- or highly controversial options, such as using hormones to suppress ovarian function -- that patients should seek only at specialized centers or in strictly controlled clinical trials, the guidelines warn.
But even the proven methods are underutilized, the panel found.
Consider Lintner, a Kalamazoo, Mich., dentist whose Hodgkin's lymphoma returned for a second bout in February 2003, in lymph nodes near her ovaries, requiring radiation that would surely shut them down.
"I thought, 'I've been through Hodgkin's before, I can handle it," says Lintner, who immediately went on a hunt for ways to have a baby once she recovered. "I don't think fertility was the main issue except for me," she says of her local physicians.
A fertility clinic advised freezing embryos, so she delayed cancer treatment for three weeks to inject herself with the necessary hormones to collect her eggs and mix them with her husband's sperm.
But during that time, she consulted University of Michigan cancer physicians about her upcoming Hodgkin's therapy -- and a doctor mentioned the little-known surgery called ovarian transposition, offered by a colleague.
Dr. Arnold Advincula, director of Michigan's minimally invasive gynecologic surgery, made keyhole incisions below Lintner's navel. Using a robot to manipulate tiny tools, he gently pulled her ovaries behind her uterus and held them in place with a few stitches.
The uterus would shield the ovaries from four weeks of radiation.
Some surgeons move the ovaries high into the abdomen by cutting the Fallopian tubes connecting them to the uterus. The ovaries still live, preventing the early menopause that radiation normally would trigger, although women then need in vitro fertilization to use their eggs to get pregnant.
But without tube-cutting, Lintner needed no extra help getting pregnant, just time to heal. On Feb. 25, 2005, a cancer-free Lintner gave birth to a healthy daughter, Maia.
"It's a great option because it doesn't delay treatment," Advincula says -- but it's rarely performed.
Partly that's because so-called ovarian transposition helps only in cases of pelvic radiation, used for gynecologic cancers or malignancies like Hodgkin's that penetrate area lymph nodes. Partly, it's because of lack of information.
For patients, often "the last thing they worry about is their fertility," says Advincula. "It doesn't really dawn on them until after they had the treatment. There's not much I can do about it to reverse the hands of time."
By LAURAN NEERGAARD
Associated Press
Published on 5/9/2006
WASHINGTON -- A week before Carrie Lintner began radiation treatment for her cancer, doctors cut tiny holes in her abdomen and pushed her ovaries out of the way of the damaging beams.
The little-known, half-hour procedure saved her ability to have a baby, but the Michigan woman learned about it by chance.
When treating cancer in young women and men, doctors too seldom warn that some of the treatments that may save their lives may also destroy their fertility -- but there are options that offer the chance of future children, if patients act in time.
"You do need to think about it before treatment, or else it will be too late," cautions Dr. Stephanie Lee of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle.
New guidelines urge the nation's cancer doctors to tell younger patients if their pending therapy puts them at risk of infertility -- and quickly refer those who want to preserve that fertility to a reproductive specialist for help.
About 10 percent of the nation's 10 million cancer survivors were diagnosed during their reproductive years, and roughly 55,000 Americans under age 35 are diagnosed each year.
The risk of infertility depends on the type of cancer and treatment. Numerous forms of chemotherapy, high-dose body-wide radiation or radiation aimed at the pelvis, and even some surgeries can leave patients unable to procreate.
Surveys suggest only about half of oncologists properly discuss the fertility risk, possibly because their focus is more on helping patients survive than on how they'll spend their life-after-cancer years. Also complicating fertility preservation is that it can cost thousands of dollars, only sometimes covered by insurance, and typically is offered only at specialized centers.
Yet studies suggest that retaining fertility is a key goal of many patients, and doctors won't know that unless they ask, stresses Lee, who led a probe of the issue for the American Society for Clinical Oncology.
What's available to help? Most successful are sperm banking for men, and for women, freezing embryos; ovarian-moving surgery; and for cervical cancer, surgery that spares the uterus, conclude ASCO's new guidelines.
There are other experimental options, such as freezing and later reimplanting ovarian tissue -- or highly controversial options, such as using hormones to suppress ovarian function -- that patients should seek only at specialized centers or in strictly controlled clinical trials, the guidelines warn.
But even the proven methods are underutilized, the panel found.
Consider Lintner, a Kalamazoo, Mich., dentist whose Hodgkin's lymphoma returned for a second bout in February 2003, in lymph nodes near her ovaries, requiring radiation that would surely shut them down.
"I thought, 'I've been through Hodgkin's before, I can handle it," says Lintner, who immediately went on a hunt for ways to have a baby once she recovered. "I don't think fertility was the main issue except for me," she says of her local physicians.
A fertility clinic advised freezing embryos, so she delayed cancer treatment for three weeks to inject herself with the necessary hormones to collect her eggs and mix them with her husband's sperm.
But during that time, she consulted University of Michigan cancer physicians about her upcoming Hodgkin's therapy -- and a doctor mentioned the little-known surgery called ovarian transposition, offered by a colleague.
Dr. Arnold Advincula, director of Michigan's minimally invasive gynecologic surgery, made keyhole incisions below Lintner's navel. Using a robot to manipulate tiny tools, he gently pulled her ovaries behind her uterus and held them in place with a few stitches.
The uterus would shield the ovaries from four weeks of radiation.
Some surgeons move the ovaries high into the abdomen by cutting the Fallopian tubes connecting them to the uterus. The ovaries still live, preventing the early menopause that radiation normally would trigger, although women then need in vitro fertilization to use their eggs to get pregnant.
But without tube-cutting, Lintner needed no extra help getting pregnant, just time to heal. On Feb. 25, 2005, a cancer-free Lintner gave birth to a healthy daughter, Maia.
"It's a great option because it doesn't delay treatment," Advincula says -- but it's rarely performed.
Partly that's because so-called ovarian transposition helps only in cases of pelvic radiation, used for gynecologic cancers or malignancies like Hodgkin's that penetrate area lymph nodes. Partly, it's because of lack of information.
For patients, often "the last thing they worry about is their fertility," says Advincula. "It doesn't really dawn on them until after they had the treatment. There's not much I can do about it to reverse the hands of time."
-
tammy figg
Rebecca,
I think this is you. They try pinning the ovaries up in the hopes that by pinning them they are moved far enough out of the way of the radiation field. I did have that done, and as I mentioned they dropped back down. Unless you are having CT scans done while receveing radiation you will not know if they are in place or not.
My guess is that you will have some radiation induced menopause anyhow and should read up on what drugs, homeopathic that you can take to help your body, soy etc.
Tammy Figg
I think this is you. They try pinning the ovaries up in the hopes that by pinning them they are moved far enough out of the way of the radiation field. I did have that done, and as I mentioned they dropped back down. Unless you are having CT scans done while receveing radiation you will not know if they are in place or not.
My guess is that you will have some radiation induced menopause anyhow and should read up on what drugs, homeopathic that you can take to help your body, soy etc.
Tammy Figg
Well my last dose of radiation was in October and I haven't had any menopausal symptoms. My radiaologist said there is a 20% chance this would happen. And usually it ocurrs right away after treatment ends. So I am still having my period- thank God. And like Becca it's not that I desperalty want more kids, I just would like to have that option availible. Plus no way I want to go through menopause at this age. So if you don't mind me asking Becca, is it going to be expensive to what the procedure you are going to have to remove your ovary?
menopause, fertility
I had radiation then chemo and surgery for stage 3 rectal cancer. I have been in menopause since the day radiation started. hot flashes, night sweats, etc. it makes me sad and i am concerned about the effects of artificial menopause at my age 35. I am considering hormone replacement therapy.
claudia
claudia
Stage 3 rectal cancer, dx May 27 2005. Lived in Maryland. Temporary Ileostomy placed. Removed May 13 2006. Age at dx: 34. 7 weeks postpartum. As of August 2007 NED and living and working in Italy.
Claudia, aside from the hot flashes and night sweats, did your menstrual cycle end all together? I had some major burning when I went through radiation. I had burns on my lower back and buttocks. Not the best feeling. But I still continue mesntruating. The doctor says that even though I am on birth control, if I were to go through menopause, the pill would not make me get my period.
Blanca
No. No periods. Now, things for me were a bit complicated by the fact that I had just had a baby on April 2 2005. Diagnosed May 27, then started radiation June 14. I had breastfed until May 27. So it takes a while to get your period back. But I have seen nothing since. I had an FSH drawn, a hormone that is high in menopause and it was sky high.
I wish I had thought more about having my ovaries moved, etc. but I was freaked and felt I needed to start treatment immediately. I could not delay. And harvesting eggs would have taken months for me I think since I had been breastfeeding and not cycling.
I am very surprised by the amount of women here who have managed to get pregnant. I do not think I ever can, but sure would be nice one day.
It is not something I would consider for several years...I just want to survive now!
claudia
No. No periods. Now, things for me were a bit complicated by the fact that I had just had a baby on April 2 2005. Diagnosed May 27, then started radiation June 14. I had breastfed until May 27. So it takes a while to get your period back. But I have seen nothing since. I had an FSH drawn, a hormone that is high in menopause and it was sky high.
I wish I had thought more about having my ovaries moved, etc. but I was freaked and felt I needed to start treatment immediately. I could not delay. And harvesting eggs would have taken months for me I think since I had been breastfeeding and not cycling.
I am very surprised by the amount of women here who have managed to get pregnant. I do not think I ever can, but sure would be nice one day.
It is not something I would consider for several years...I just want to survive now!
claudia
Stage 3 rectal cancer, dx May 27 2005. Lived in Maryland. Temporary Ileostomy placed. Removed May 13 2006. Age at dx: 34. 7 weeks postpartum. As of August 2007 NED and living and working in Italy.
Return to “Colon Talk - Colon cancer (colorectal cancer) support forum”
Who is online
Users browsing this forum: Google [Bot], Michmash77 and 161 guests