Hi
My Dad was fairly recently diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer. He has a large tumour in his right lung and this has metastasised to his media stinum and peritoneum. We just found out yesterday that he also has cancer in his brain. Prior to having the CT scan of his head on Tuesday of this week, were told he was eligible for immunotherapy and that this wouldn't change no matter what the head CT showed as he was already stage 4.
He has been on steroids for a couple of weeks, 1 week at 4mg then 1 week at 2mg. He finished these around Wednesday morning. Thursday and Friday we saw a marked deterioration in him and I spoke to the oncology nurse yesterday. He has now been given more steroids at a higher dose (8mg). She says this may affect his treatment so we are waiting to speak to the oncologist on Tuesday.
I have been reading a lot about his type of cancer and the metastases and have been alarmed by the poor prognosis for brain mets but then reading other articles have felt more hopeful as the newer treatments do seem to give more favourable prognosis if successful. At the moment though I am worried if he will be fit enough to start treatment, as this doesn't start until a week on Thursday.
I have also been reading about stereotactic radiotherapy treatment for brain mets.
I guess I'm just hoping to talk to people in similar situations as you only learn so much from reading articles etc and I would like to hear other people's experiences. I'm trying to stay very positive and strong but it's not always easy.
Sorry for the long post.
Andrea
