chemotherapy one cycle enough

Ali1983 7 months ago

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Hi all,

I had a suspected malignant tumour and an orchiectomy which confirmed, embryonal non-seminoma.
It grew fast! Confirmed Stage 1 as the CT scan a week before surgery showed no apparent signs of spread.
My blood markers have always came back normal pre and post surgery. Even when it growing and the tumour was becoming painful the blood markers were all in range.

so now the oncologist has offered preventative chemotherapy one cycle of BOP Q10 or BEP, I chose BOP Q10 and will start one cycle end of this week.

My question(s) and anyone with similar experience is…did you find one cycle enough? My blood markers are always normal (it seems) so how will I know if it’s worked?

Is the CT scan the only way for me to tell if I am free of the little critters, or should I consider asking to do another cycle to be on the safe side and long term better chances of this not returning.

Topcat23 7 months ago

It sounds like your surgery went well and markers are good which is nice to hear.

I don't think there is a way of "knowing" if the adjuvant (preventative) chemo has worked. My understanding was that it lowered your chance of a relapse from say 20-25% to say 5-10% within 5 years. Please don't quote me on the numbers but i recall it was in that order - and i believe it also varies based on your tumour type.

I went for / was advised to have the single cycle - its your choice as they cant force you to turn up ;-) For me the numbers made it seem like the right thing and also that i had then done "all i could" at the time. I am now on a 5 year monitoring plan which i believe is standard whether you have the chemo or not.

Good luck with your decision.

Ali1983 7 months ago in reply to Topcat23

Hi Topcat23,

Thanks for the reply, I think you are right there is no way to knowing, I am planning to go ahead with the BOPQ10 and must develop mechanisms to deal with the uncertainty.

Hope and pray your tests continue to be all clear. All the best

Ali

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chemotherapy one cycle enough