Claudine wrote:Looks like you’re always on top of things beach sunrise! I just wanted to add that my husband did Folfiri/Avastin for his many small lung nodules (I think the largest one was 5mm), he finished systemic chemo over 3 years ago and his lungs have been clear since, no recurrence there, so there’s something to be said for heavy chemo sometimes
Congratulations and thanks for sharing your husband's met sizes and CEA data over the years.
Any CA199 and LDH data would be valuable, along with peak MCV.
Perceptions and definitions
Do we mentally classify "heavy chemo" by dose intensity, the side effects and toxicity, the total dose, the toxicity to the cancer and tumor response, or some combination?
One oncologist classed my wife as heavily treated ( not exactly the same as "heavy chemo") after 10-11 months of our home brew with 3-4 dinky chemo pills and just starting with low dose leucovorin. Also she had had 800 - 1600 mg/day of biomarker targeted cimetidine, 45 mg menaquinone-4/day for 7 months and literally, kilograms of IV ascorbate, an anti HIF-1a and anti KRAS tx, along with a lot of nutraceuticals. We had not yet started celecoxib beyond days-2 weeks after surgery.
Perhaps ideally, extra heavy chemo might have 1-2 chemical treatments, 100% complete response, and no side effects.
I think it is fair to say that beach sunrise uses a nonstandard "heavy chemo", but not an ASCO/NCCN recommended cyclical heavy chemo nor does she have as much intolerance from toxicity, where her first oncologist failed at both with Folfox alone. It is true that we don't know her response to Folfiri + Avastin, Folfoxiri + Avastin or even Folfox + Avastin, where oncology take 2-3 swings at these series and hopes for at least one (often temporary) response, whatever you get.