Hi everyone.
I would just like to ask if anyone has ended up stopping Anastrozole due the the side effects?
I have been taking this tablet since December 2020, that's around 18 months, and at first the side effects weren't too bad. I could put up with the stiff joints and dry eyes, if that was what it took to keep the Cancer at bay.
But over the last few months i have suffered daily with blinding headaches and in the last couple of weeks heart palpitations and breathlessness, which were really scary and for me the last straw.
I haven't taken a tablet for over a week now and things seem to be slowly improving for me. My quality of life had become so bad, I will never take another one of these tablets again.
Why do they not tell you about how bad it can get on these tablets? Are the side affects cumulative? How long does it take for them to leave your system?
I am going to contact my BCN and see if there is anything else that I can take. I will be honest and say that taking Anastrozole for me was worse than going through Chemotherapy, and that is something I never thought I would say!
Hi mitteny
Have you tried different brands of Anastrozole? I had done my own reading before taking mine and was super worried about the side effects, but luckily for me the brand I first got from the pharmacy was ok and I didn't get much in the way of side effects. On my repeat, at my local pharmacy I was given Accord and this continued for about a year. Then, the pharmacy couldn't get Accord and prescribed me another brand - within a day it felt as though I had been hit by a truck!
I decided to research all the brands that are able to be prescribed via NHS (ie the ones that don't cost too much and if the pharmacy has the brand, they can give you them without intervention from the doctor). The coatings of the different brands of tablets can be wildly different. I was trawling different chemists in my town and then if we went anywhere else, popping into pharmacies to see if they had Accord, but my research showed that TEVA brand had the same coatings as Accord, so for about a year and half I had these from my local pharmacy. I specifically asked my doctor to write on my prescription slip (Accord or TEVA only).
I decided to 'test' that other brand again as I had the packet left - and boom! same problem within a day, so I knew 100% that something in the coatings was affecting me. Within one day of taking the other TEVA tablet, I was fine again. I think I have been lucky anyway with menopause, as I had been through it with no side effects just before I was diagnosed with breast cancer, so I guess we are all different in how we react to lack of oestrogen.
If you look at this link, the names of the brands are at the top which can be prescribed easily. Then type in the line -e.g. (Anastrozole 1mg tablets (Accord Healthcare Ltd) ) in a search for the active ingredients and you'll see what's in the coatings of the tablets.
If you haven't yet tried different brands, then ask for one which has different coatings to the brand you have been using and see if it makes a difference to your symptoms.
Other ladies have been changed to different drugs when they have really struggled with side effects, but it will most definitely be worth trying the different brands of Anastrozole first before being moved to another type entirely.
I hope this helps.
Best Wishes, Lesley
