Chemo 3 Sucks Rocks

Chemo 3 hit me hard.  The dose didn't increase at all but I'm feeling the cumulative effects of the chemotherapy.  I was in bed for 16 to 18 hrs per day for five days straight on my 3rd chemo treatment.  Plus, instead of not being able to feel my fingertips on my left hand, all the fingers on my left hand started going numb and the fingers on my right hand started going numb a few days ago which was about 7 days after the start of chemo 3.  Throw in a few bouts of diarrhea in the wee hours of the morning and it made for an all around miserable time.

Here it is nine days after the start of chemo 3 and I'm well rested and I feel 70%.  Pretty darned good.  The feeling in all my fingers is starting to return.

We had an appointment with Dr. Goodwin, my chemo doctor, yesterday and after I described my symptoms she immediately piped up that we were stopping the oxaliplatin.  Yay!!!  She's worried about permanent nerve damage in my fingers and it obviously is way too much for me.  I shouldn't be in bed for five days straight.  I should feel tired and need to nap for 1 hr each day but that's the extent.

So, now that I'm ditching the ox next week it also means I don't need injections of calcium and magnesium for one hour which were to counteract the neuropathic effects of the ox.  The main drug now will just be the fluorouracil (5-FU as it's commonly called) and associated steriods, leucovorin injection and whatever the hell else they jam into me.  Instead of the 3.5 hour chemo injection that I had last week, I can expect a brief 1.5 hour injection period at the hospital and then they'll send me home with my bottle of 5-FU hooked up to my hip for 48 hours. 

I'm feeling a lot better about this.  The news got even better.  Because I'm only on the 5-FU, Dr. Goodwin suggested moving me to the pills instead of the bottle.  Holy crap, I almost kissed her!  That means the PICC line in my bicep could disappear and I won't have restrictions of going into the hospital or being at home to take my chemo.  I could just take pills on my own.  The pills are capecitabine and, once processed by my liver, acts the same as 5-FU.  The goal would be to start these in mid-July for my 5th treatment.  I would take these for the four remaining treatments for 14 days straight followed by 7 days of no pills on a three week rotation. 

The pills, like the bottle, are expensive.  Each treatment would be about $2,500 to $3,000 and this brings it to over $10,000 for my four remaining treatments.  My government health insurance covers 80% of my prescriptions so my out of pocket portion would be in the neighbourhood of $2,000.  The good news is I've applied for a manufacturer's program which may pay the remaining 20% not covered by my insurance.  I'll probably get news on that in a week or so.  Interesting that the manufacturer of the pills has a program to pick up 20% of the tab.  I see it as a sales gimmick.  It allows them to sell more pills at the expense of reducing profit from 300% to 280%.