Hello everyone
My wife has begun Radiotherapy every week day for 7 weeks with 3 sessions of Chemotherapy which occur every 21 days and are 2 days x 6 hours work of treatment. 2 hours hydration (2 liters) then 2 hours chemo then 2 hours hydration (again 2 liters)
We are in week 2 of treatment and all the effects that should have occurred from week 3 happened from week 1.
My wife has an enteral feeding tube due to quick weight loss and difficulty eating.
The feeding tube works fine and she gets nourishment over a 12 hour period. She has been in hospital - In Paris i should add - for 8 days due to the implantation of the permanent catheter central line and the gastro-enteral tube, she is feeling better and has restarted eating normally as well as the tube.
My question; As she is on a feeding bag for 8 hours 3 times a day, how can she go to the hospital for her treatments seeing as she has to carry the feed bag and pump. Is there a backpack she can get to make the travelling easier?
Also, how long is she expected to keep the enteral tube after treatment finishes in 5 weeks?
Thanks
Greg
Hi Greg (Excalibur and welcome to the community and the chat group.
You haven’t mentioned your wife’s cancer type specifically but I will assume from your post that it’s a head and neck cancer. If this is correct, we have a specific support group you can join to connect with patients and carers for different types of h&n cancer.
This is the link
Once you click on the link, it will take you straight to the group and you can join and copy your post there. It’s a very helpful and active group, and the members there should be able to help you.
I wish your wife all the best with her continuing treatment, and hope it goes a bit more smoothly for her.
Sarah xx
Hi Greg, in case you are still visiting the forum
Yes you can get a backpack which the hospital should supply. The alternative is to feed at night while your wife sleeps. This is what I did.
Her feeding tube is likely to stay in until she is eating and maintaining her weight. This can be anything from around six months onward.
Dani
Base of tongue cancer. T2N0M0 6 weeks Radiotherapy finished January 2019
Hi Greg. I know how you feel. In some ways it’s worse for a carer. Us patients get all the attention and care leaving our spouses behind. Have faith. The treatment is awful but it doesn’t last forever and your wife will get better.
I don’t know about the reeducation bit but I can tell you I didn’t swallow anything at all for eight weeks and I didn’t need to re learn to swallow. I did my exercises every day and by 12 weeks I was eating. I couldn’t taste it but it was fuel and it went down. Recovery is a marathon and most of us get there sometimes steps back but generally forward.
Day by Day and time flies… it really does.
Make sure her analgesia is right. I had long acting morphine twice a day with oramorph for breakthrough pain. There’s nothing on earth that deals completely with the acute pain of swallowing so I stopped swallowing but the morphine kept me comfortable. I also gave up “eating” in the day and pump fed at night. That left my days clear to try to find where I had lost myself and to be as normal as possible.
Plod on. You’ll both get there.
Dani
Base of tongue cancer. T2N0M0 6 weeks Radiotherapy finished January 2019
