Please someone, tell me it's working

[midlifemom]

For the past three months my cea has been slowly rising - 2.9, 3.9, 3.6, 4.3, 6.8, 7.4. This corresponds with lung things showing up and growing.

I had two infusions of avastin and today's cea was down to 6.2!

Ct next week - but perhaps this drop in cea indicates avastin is working?

Today was chemo and I feel like crap. Would be easier to deal with if I know chemo is doing its job.

[Sams wife]

I hope it is!! No insider info but I hope so. sorry you feel like crap

[Nik Colon]

My CEA went from 4.9 at start, slowly went down on folfox, 1.2 after surgery (or was it right b4) then up to 4.7? or so after iri, so idk.

Hopefully all looks good on upcoming scans. Try not to worry until you find out. Best wishes

I know iri can raise cea at times, not sure how long, but it happens.

[LeonW]

two infusions of avastin and cea was down to 6.2

That CEA marker may be working for you; I hope it is.
Had dropping CEA from second infusion of Avastin too - see my sig. When it started dropping, onc found that promising and indeed, follow up scans showed shrinking mets. That's liver mets in my case. Hope your lung mets react the same.

Yeah, chemo is crap, but god-sent if it works . .
I hope your scan next week will confirm.
Keep up the spirits

Leon

[rp1954]

You're checking with surgeons about VATS etc, right? You want to get locally curative surgery if neessary / possible, and not all centers/surgeons are equal. Did you get any CA19-9 data to improve your ciimetidine estimates?

You've probably seen my comments on better (more) blood data. We don't have much experience on the board with lung mets but some panels may show the improvements, if tracked closely and monitored for inflammation.

[stu]

Hi. Straight from my mum' s oncologists mouth" they look for an initial downward trend". After that they know chemo itself can affect readings.
I would take it as a good sign at this point.
Hope your feeling a wee bit better today.
Kind regards
Stu

[midlifemom]

Thanks all for your responses.

I have asked about surgery, biopsy, VATS, AND RFA. Was told by Sloan and local onc the lung spots were too small. (Told this by oncologists). Dr. K at Sloan was against cimitidine and it upsets my stomach anyway. If having surgery, I will try again. Never got the ca-19. Was busy yesterday's visit asking for MSI status.

[cathy123]

Crossing my fingers the lower Cea means tumors are shrinking!

[midlifemom]

Crossing my fingers the lower Cea means tumors are shrinking!

Oh, me too! Thanks!

[rp1954]

The reason I'm poking at this is that if the chemo is only partially successful, say wipes out one or some, shrinks others, you might want to have your surgical ducks in a row, ready to go right after the nadir, or even coming into whatever "surgical range" is available with a particular surgeon. We've seen a huge variation on surgery practices for lung mets on the boards, so I'd be finding the best potential sites, drs and potential offers now. Starting to shop around after a nadir takes too much time to be optimal and might lose a surgical offer.

I know you struck out on cimetidine tolerability with Folfiri, earlier. There has been some irinotecan-cimetidine intolerance showing up and cimetidine might be ok without the iri-.
If you are headed for surgery, the cimetidine tolerance is especially important in the weeks between stopping avastin/irinotecan and surgery (some papers show 5FU use closer in, even up to surgery). Since you are CEA posiive and Kras mutant, I'd really check my CA19-9 serum while with tumor load, and maybe the old tissue samples too, for the cimetidine question long term if you can stomach cimetidine while off iri-.

[lpas]

Ugh. Such a catch-22 that you have to sit around waiting for lung thingies to grow before you can have them removed.

The CEA drop definitely sounds like a good sign to me. I hope you're feeling better soon.

[Lee]

When I was on chemo, FOLFOX, my CEA did rise. I was told this sometimes happens. CEA is picking up a protein that a dieing cancer cells are emitting. They only did a blood test once while on chemo and it did go down after I finished.

Butt, I was not an Avastin, hope this helps.

Lee