I had chemo in 2019 for breast cancer and a friend who had it the year after says her doctor advised having her childhood vaccinations (MMR, tetanus etc) repeated after her treatment finished as the chemo could reduce the protection significantly. Is this advised for all cancer patients or does it depend on which chemo drugs you have? Thanks.
Dear Bloominell57c261,
Thank you for getting in touch and welcome to the Online Community. I’m Kerry one of the Cancer Information Nurses here on the Macmillan Support Line.
I hope you are recovering well since your treatment for breast cancer back in 2019.
In some circumstances a person may be advised to repeat their childhood vaccinations depending on their cancer or the treatments they received for it.
The effect of treatment on a person’s immune system can depend on the cancer drug and the dose of the drug or radiotherapy treatment.
If you have any concerns about your level of immunity, you can reach out to your cancer specialist team or your GP to discuss this further.
Your healthcare team will be able to discuss your immunity risks further and may arrange a blood test to check your antibody levels if they felt this was appropriate for you.
Cancer Research UK has some further information on this that you may find helpful here.
You may find it supportive talking to others in similar situations too, here on our Online Community we have our friendly breast cancer chat forum and Breast Cancer Now charity offers support too
I hope this information is helpful. If you have any further questions, please get in touch again. You can also speak with the Macmillan Support Line team of experts. Phone free on 0808 808 0000 (7 days a week, 8am-8pm) or send us an email or contact us through Webchat.
Best wishes
Kerry
Cancer Information Nurse Specialist
Ref KHa/AW
