Tablets

Hi Shar

Welcome - bicalutamide is prescribed when you are about to start hormone therapy. It works by blocking the effect of androgen (a male hormone) to stop the growth of the cancer cells. (It's sometimes called a hormone flare). The injection 2 weeks later will be the first of his HT (hormone therapy) injections. This is a female hormone to reduce his testosterone.

Prostate cancer lives on testosterone - if you haven't got any  - well it can't thrive and grow!!

There will be side effects and we all experience different ones - I would think a few days holiday at this stage won't be a problem.

If you click on the icon of the beach next to my name you can follow my journey down the HT route - I hope this helps.

Ask anything you want - there are plenty of people who know lots more than me in this community.

Kind Regards

Brian

Brian thank you so much. What a journey you have been on but good to hear you are doing so well. 3 months ago I had never even heard of PSA or gleeson scores, my husband's is 4 + 5 but no one explained what this is. He has pet scan next week to see if spread then they will decide on treatment but have mentioned radiotherapy and possibly chemo. We have cancelled a holiday in September just in case, but still hope to do the Christmas one. Do they advise you not to go away after radiotherapy ends. Sorry for so many questions 

Hello Shar, I’m sorry you are struggling to get information. Take a look at www,prostatecancer.co.uk. They produce lots of easy to understand leaflets on different aspects of pc eg diagnostics, surgery, hormone therapy etc. I found the leaflets very useful.

I think your biggest problem with going away is to get reasonably priced travel insurance if going abroad. We could not get this until after my husbands radiotherapy was completed. At that point, the oncologist was advocating waiting for 6-8 weeks until things had settled down after the radiotherapy!  We’ve just returned from a river boat cruise in Germany and that was superb. I do know that some people have travelled without insurance but I was not able to take that risk bearing in mind that if anything went wrong I would have been the one to have had to sort things! As it happens, we would have been fine to travel as nothing went wrong!

I hope all goes well for you and your husband

Hi Shar,

Ive been following your journey so far. 

You need to contact your GP and tell them that you are confused as to what's happening and you don't have any support such as a nurse team to talk to. Meanwhile if you click on the "Ask the expert" at the top of the page it will take you through to a section that has "ask a nurse" so use this to get professional help also.

Brian has explained the Bicalutamide.- here's an add on to the flare : We were told that when you first have the Hormone injections the body can experience a hormone "flare" which is a moment when the body could produce a large amount of testosterone, the body's reaction with trying "kick start" the mans natural hormone "testosterone" again. This flare can cause the cancer to suddenly spread in some cases, so Bicalutamide stops this. think of it as a slow and safe introduction for the body to accept a drop in testosterone thus getting it ready for the more powerful injections that will be next. 

L

Thank you we have travel insurance until February 24 and they have said we are covered for this until renewal. We were thinking of just a short break in uk

Thank you, he only has 28 days of tablets

Thats ok, Have this conversation with a macmillan nurse and then you will feel more reassured that everything is going the right way. Also have that holiday . My partner is now having the Radiotherapy and there was a nice big gap of bringing the PSA down before that. 

L

Would like to do a river cruise. We love cruising on should have been on a cruise now but had to cancel it last Thursday, 2 days before we were due to go. Never mind there are others booked and we are focusing on being able to do the Xmas one now, got to wear although dresses I bought

That sounds like a great plan, you have that excellent insurance so maybe you could do a last minute abroad somewhere after the injection when thing settle down a bit more. Get those holidays in before you have to get a new quote for insurance.

Hi Shar - good that you’ve got insurance! We were devastated by the diagnosis and the journey through the diagnostics etc. pC took over our lives!

Once we had got through the radiotherapy we decided we had to live for the moment and enjoy ourselves and kick pc into the background as much as possible. We had our holiday, my husband bought a new car, he arranged a day out with our grandchildren….. As I see it, we can make the most of the good days, make nice memories etc. yesterday, on a whim, we went for a day on the beach ( some 75 miles away). Today we are attending a family bbq. Simple pleasures but enjoying ourselves!

I don’t know your circumstances but our intention is to do all we can to keep on top of the pc but to get the most out of our lives whilst we can !