Hello.
My dad was diagnosed with a NEC tumour in his colon and surrounding lymph nodes in March of this year. The plan was for six rounds of chemo, but he had a terrible time with sepsis and a blockage, so he only managed a few rounds before emergency surgery was done to remove the blockage and the tumour in July. He went back to chemo after this and, just a month ago, he was the best he has been in over a year, until he started getting pain in his right shoulder blade.
Today we were told that the cancer has returned to his colon and spread to his liver. We were told that the only option is chemo, however, it only works for 10% of people and, even then, it would only extend his life by a few months.
He is in a huge amount of pain (he also developed morphine toxicity this weekend) and the revised medication doesn't seem to be giving him much relief. At the moment, his only focus is, understandably, on getting his pain managed so everything else is on pause until then. We haven't been given any idea of the time frame and we were all a bit blindsided today so probably didn't ask that many questions, but we will go back to the consultant soon.
I was just wondering if anyone here could give me some advice on your experiences and/or give me any suggestions of things we should be asking about.
Does anyone have any advice on pain medications, other than morphine, pregablin and oxycodone, that we can ask about to help him?
Does anyone have any advice to help with his itching?
Does anyone have any positive stories that can give me a bit of hope at this really hard time?
Thank you.
Kyle
Hi Kyle/kvh56979d and a very warm welcome to the online community which I hope you'll find is both an informative and supportive place to be.
I’m Anne, one of the Community Champions here on the Online Community and, although I'm not a member of this group, I noticed that your post hadn't had any replies yet. Responding to you will 'bump' it back to the top of the discussion list again.
Being in a lot of pain must be terrible for both your dad and you and I wondered if you or he had spoken to his hospital team about this. They wouldn't want your dad to be suffering and would want to try and get him the right pain relief. If your dad has been assigned a cancer nurse specialist (CNS), sometimes referred to as a Macmillan nurse, please give them a call today to tell them about the pain your dad is in. If you can't get through to them, then don't hesitate to call NHS111 who will be able to advise.
Sending virtual ((hugs)) to both you and your dad.
"Never regret a day in your life, good days give you happiness, bad days give you experience"
