Second Week on VMP

Mom is still doing all right. Dr. Picozzi does a check-up and bloodwork every week and determines whether she can continue without a break. So far, her counts are fine. The worst thing appears to be mouth ulcers and sores on her lips. They prescribed a "magic mouthwash" that has an anesthetic and we're trying various lip ointments including biotene gel and chapstick for lip sores. She has moderate nausea but this seems to be controlled by the three nausea medications she is taking. They have started giving her IV fluids an additional twice a week to make sure she is hydrated. So far everything is fine - Dr. Picozzi said week three and four are critical in terms of symptoms so we hope that she continues to be able to tolerate the treatment. The good news is we are about 40% done by now with the first phase.

First Week on VMP

My mother has finally begun the VMP with Dr. Picozzi. The first stage of the VMP consists of 3 types of drugs combined with radiation. They inserted a PICC line into my mother's arm which is a small catheter that runs from the arm to just above the heart. This is used to infuse the chemo drugs and IV fluids. They have hooked up a pump that my mother carries around with her for continuous infusion of 5FU. She receives an IV bag of Cisplatin once a week along with 3 bags of IV fluids to hydrate her. She receives subcutaneous injections of Interferon Alpha three times a week. Finally, she gets radiation for a few minutes every day. The first day of treatment she received all 4 portions of the treatment. At night she suffered from severe fever (up to 103) for several hours but Dr. Picozzi said that is not an uncommon side effect of the interferon especially on the first shot. Her second shot was much better and she didn't get feverish at all. Mostly, she is naseous and fatigued and has been sleeping a lot. She's already not doing well so we're quite worried it's going to get really hard towards the latter stages. I'm hoping she doesn't suffer too much.