What is everyone’s experience with immunotherapy?

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Hi everyone, my dad has had 2 cycles of chemo and the 3rd one postponed until after a ct scan this Monday to check if the chemo is working or not. Doc says if it’s not working she’ll stop chemo. He was told he couldn’t get surgery or radiotherapy as a treatment option as the tumour is too big (stage 3 non small cell lung cancer). No one has mentioned immunotherapy so far. Keen to hear of others experiences with immunotherapy, are there tests for it? Is there a sequence of events that need to happen before you’re considered for it?

I plan to ask about it when we next meet the doc next week too.

Thanks in advance!

Natalie

StevePr over 1 year ago in reply to Kadunc

It depends on the side effects, not just the ones you can feel but the ones you can't, that are detected by blood tests that tell if your system isn't handling the situation. I just counted them, there are 53 little charts on my Patients Know Best website. So far so good, they still stay in the normal range or, if slightly outside, trend nice and flat. Physically I'm still good to go for immunotherapy with low side effects and no apparent damage yet.

It also depends on your finances if going private (or two years if NHS). I checked my statements. Last year my private treatment on Pembolizumab every 3 weeks plus blood tests, head+chest scans every 3 months, chinwags with the consultant, etc charged my insurance £109,993.46.

Those are the constraints: damage to your body and wallet. As long as they can stand it then you can go indefinitely. So far, I'm over four years.

Kind regards,
Steve

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What is everyone’s experience with immunotherapy?