Irinotecan dosage for Stage IV questions

[hurnik]

Hello,

Mom's got Stage 4 colon cancer. Was on Folfox and now the cancer has spread locally (meaning still in abdominal area, not lungs/liver). They are now putting her on Irinotecan + Avastin. She's had Folfox + Avastin, but had to stop due to allergic reactions to the Oxy, and obviously the 5FU not working well anymore. Plus she has 5FU toxicity.

So they have her on the following Irinotecan cycle:
Week 1: Infusion over 3-4 hours, send her home
Week 2: Infusion over 3-4 hours, send her home
Week 3: Off

Repeat above cycle. Now, due to her 5FU toxicity and Oxy allergic reaction (plus allergic reaction to Neulasta), they are putting her on half dose week one and half week 2. Which *I* thought meant that a "normal" person would get:
Week 1: Infusion
Week 2-3: Off

But apparently not?

My co-workers' mom is also Stage 4 (lungs/liver) and they have her on Irinotecan only (no Avastin) and she gets a pump for 3 days for Week 1 and then has Week2/3 off.

I can't seem to find anything that says "typical" Irinotecan cycle (like I could for Folfox which was normally 1 week on, 1 week off, but sometimes 1 week on and 2 weeks off).

Any ideas? I'm sure the docs are doing what's good, but just curious as to the differences (pump infusion), etc.

Any scientific articles/etc links would be great!

[canadiandaughter]

MY dad dad 30 infusions of folfiri (iri) and he would have 3 hours, then take a pump home for 48 hours. He had this every two weeks unless his blood levels were low which only happened twice. They started him on folfox with avastin and he has had 6 of those, scanned today, so we find out Monday how its going. But he had the same routine with it, every two weeks with a take home pump. He has had the dosage lowered twice on folfox, I believe he is down to 70% right now but had full dosage of the folfiri.

[Lund5505]

Folfiri which is 5fu + irinotecan is typically given every two weeks with an infusion of irinotecan and the take home pump of 5fu

Irinotecan mono therapy typically is irinotecan infusion every three weeks.

Sounds like they are splitting the irinotecan dose over two weeks to help with the toxicity.

If your friends has a take home pump I would be shocked if that is something other than 5fu.

Hopefully your mother is not having too much trouble with diarrhea which is the most common side effect

[Nik Colon]

Typical for FOLFIRI is same as FOLFOX (with pump) 2 weeks, same as XELIRI or XELOX (with pills) 3 weeks

Both the same except the irinotecan or oxaliplatin

(Again, this is the norm, but they have to adjust at times, or reduce dose, or take out, etc)

[tdsamal]

So I am on Folfri with Avastin. My infusions are every 2 weeks for 4 hours with a pump for the next 48 hours. My Dr has told me that I could go 3 weeks in between infusions to help with the side effects if I wanted to. I chose to just get it over with and try and live with side effects. Don't know if I made the right decision or not. Fatigue has me down real bad right now.

Tammy