Moving from ABVD to escBeacopDac

Hi Harri23 sorry to hear this but unfortunately this does happen a lot.

HL at times can be stubborn so some folks need to have a prolonged period of treatment to get them over the line.

Over the years I have been volunteering on here and the Lymphoma Action Support Platforms I have talked with many people who had to navigate the same journey and many say that they did not find the escBeacopDac to be no more challenging then the ABCD…. with some saying it was less demanding as the main work had been done ((hugs))

Hi Mike, 

Thank you. Reassuring to hear that people didn’t find it worse. I think it’s the amount of treatment days that will take its toll over anything else then. Another hurdle to get over. Cancer sure does throw everything at you doesn’t it! 

Harriet 

Yes Harriet there are significant challenges that have to be navigated…… my main chemo was only being used to open the door for me to go into Stem Cell Transplant.

I am in Inverness but my SCT unit was in Glasgow so a 7-8hr round trip drive every time we did the journey…… and we did it over 30 times !!!

Oh my word! I don’t know how you managed so much travelling. Makes me seem silly for complaining about a 2.5 hour round trip!! 
I’m feeling a bit more positive about things today. I think it’s easy to focus on the negatives but having thought about my scan results there are very reassuring signs there such as there being no more active lymphoma in my pelvic bone anymore :) It’s just the soft tissue mass in my chest that’s proving to be more stubborn.. hopefully Beacop will blast it! 

I think our brains are hard wired to instantly go down the catastrophes rabbit-hole…… and we can miss the actual positives. 

Having had multiply relapses over my many years I think I have been able to rewire the space between my ears so that ai am always looking for the Gold.

Do your best to park this and get in with enjoying Christmas and look for 2024 to be a good healthy year ((hugs))

You’re absolutely right. Time to get into Christmas and enjoy it whilst I feel well (my chemo was cancelled this week, I was expecting to feel dreadful on Christmas Day!) Silver linings and all that..

Hope you have a lovely Christmas :) 

Hi,

I had to make a similar decision in september when my interim pet scan showed that there was still a large area of lymphoma in my lung. Because if I had continued on ABVD there was the chance I would then have to have radiotherapy if it still hadn't completely gone (which then would have given me an increased risk of breast cancer because of where they would have to target) I decided to have the escBeacopdac treatement. Sometimes I regreted that decision. The side effects on ABVD I found much more manageable than the escalated treatment (no mouth sores or horrid bone pain from injections) so you probably made the right call. 

I get what you mean about it hits hard. It feels like you've failed slightly because it hasn't completely worked so there isn't the sense of going into the next cycles still with the sense of unknown. 

Hope the treatments going well

Hi Harri23, I know I'm a couple months late to the thread so I hope you're okay and doing better now. 

I wanted to share that I had pretty much the same thing happen. I had hodkins lymphoma, they did a PET scan after 2 cycles of ABVD and it showed that it had shrunk a bit but not enough, so they encouraged me to switch to escalated beacopp. Honestly for me it was harder, the side effects were more severe so I had a lot more sickness and fatigue and I didn't have as much energy between cycles compared to ABVD. They also gave me filgrastim injections which made my bones ache. The good news is it worked really well, I had another PET after 3 cycles of that and was given the all clear at the start of my 4th cycle. 

I hope this doesn't sound really negative, it was a really challenging few months on escalated beacopp but I'm glad I did it. 

Happy to give any more info if it helps! 

- Kat

Hey! I know I’m late to the party but I’m going through exactly what you are. I heard today my PET mid way isn’t where they expect although some improvements and I feel better in myself. They’ve suggested escalating to BEACOPP. How are you doing?

I like you as worried about the logistics. The hospital is a 2 hour drive away and going 3 days in a row etc. how did you manage it?

sending strengtH

sarah

Hey Kat! Thankyou for sharing. So glad to read your doing okay now. How did the treatment look for you. Did you go in and out each day?