Hi,
My mother was diagnosed with rectal cancer in April 2017. She did 6 weeks of chemo/radiation with Xeloda and managed that ok. She then had her LAR surgery in August with a temporary ileostomy. She started her 1st round of adjuvant chemo on Nov. 6th. She had an infusion of oxailplatin and capcetiabine pills. She seemed to be managing that ok, but she started to feel very weak and nauseous towards the end of her 2 weeks with the xeloda pills. She was admitted to the hospital for dehydration on Nov. 22 and has been there ever since. She's not getting any better. They are trying to manager her nausea, and keep her hydrated. Her kidney function is off. She's hardly eating and drinking and now is refusing medicine. She is too weak to even stand at this point. The output from her ileostomy is huge, so they think that her gut has failed. I honestly don't know how so much is coming out when she has hardly put in anything in 2 weeks. Today, they inserted a PICC line for TPN. She is basically wasting away and I'm so scared. They tested the stool for C-diff, and that came back ok. Her blood counts are ok. They scanned her head and chest and found nothing. They won't scan her abdomen because they don't want to use the contrast for the CT scan because of her kidney function. So, my question is has anyone had this sort of delayed response to capox? All of the doctors say that this is a pretty well tolerated regime and this is really rare. I just don't know what more I can do, but I know that I need her to keep fighting. I'm not ready to lose her.
Also, it's clear that she is depressed, but she won't admit it. How can you help someone with that? I figure some of you may have been in this situation before and could offer advice.