Hi everyone. I am continuing my melanoma in situ journey with Aldara cream application following a local excision with margins on my face. Prescribed 6 week course of Aldara After 3 weeks of applying the Aldara the application area did go very sore with scabs which was expected. However one side of my face became very swollen and I was very unwell with joint pain, tiredness and headaches. I informed the medical team of my symptoms and I stopped using the cream. 4 days after reporting the symptoms I had an appointment with a skin cancer specialist nurse who arranged for medical photography as the consultant was not available to see me. This was a pre arranged appointment nothing to do with the facial swelling. My symptoms started to subside over the next couple of days and I had no contact from the consultant. I had to ring the hospital 7 days after my initial contact regarding the facial swelling and was advised by the skin cancer nurse specialist that consultant advice was to continue to use the cream for another 3 weeks. I have started using the cream again as advised but I have so lost faith in the medical team. All the information I have about Aldara I have gained from here or online and the advice online states if the 6 week course is interrupted to not go beyond what would have been the 6 weeks initial application time. I know I will be advised not to use Google but in the absence of medical team advice I did want to learn as much as I could about my medication. Any advice or support would be appreciated. Many thanks x
Hi Luky welcome to the forum..I can appreciate your confusion and wonder if you could speak to one of The Nurses at Macmillan? They are the best people to advise I think on this one. You can contact the helpline on 08088080000. Hope you manage to get some answers and do come back and let us know how you get on. Best wishes for now.
gail
Hi Luky and a second welcome to the melanoma group
I'm sorry I'm only just replying to your post but I seem to have missed it when you first posted.
I haven't used Aldara cream myself and, unfortunately, haven't been able to find any previous posts in the group from people who have. This doesn't mean of course that no one here has been prescribed Aldara, it could just be that they haven't posted about it.
However, lots of people in the skin cancer group are prescribed Aldara to treat skin cancers like basal cell carcinomas so it might be an idea to also join that group and post there as well.
If this is something that you'd like to do clicking on the link I've created will take you straight there and, once you've joined, you can start a new post in the same way as you did here and join in with existing conversations by clicking on 'reply'.
It would be great if you could put something about your diagnosis and treatment to date into your profile as it really helps others when replying to you and also when looking for someone on a similar pathway. It also means that you don't have to keep repeating yourself. To do this click on your username and then select 'Profile'. You can amend it at any time and if you're not sure what to write you can take a look at mine by clicking on my username.
"Never regret a day in your life, good days give you happiness, bad days give you experience"
