After getting my port accessed and blood drawn, I headed up to the infusion room.
When the medical assistant took my weight, it was the highest since I started treatment. I'm almost 10 pounds more than my pre-chemo weight. This is pretty depressing. It's not exactly unexpected, since weight gain is a side effect on Lupron and a symptom of menopause. My old medical oncologist had advised me to not worry about losing weight while on chemo, so I really hadn't been thinking about it. But I'm not happy with the weight gain, so maybe it's time to pay attention.
I was in a bay by 9:30, but waited until almost 10:00 for my infusion nurse. I told her all about the recent developments with the symptoms in my hands. She said she could tell that my left hand is still a bit swollen, which probably explains why my left hand feels worse than my right. She said fluid retention could very well be a side effect from the Lupron. I guess that means I might not be able to get rid of it, though sometimes medication side effects subside after a while, so who knows.
She also said the symptoms might be a delayed reaction from chemo, as my physical therapist suggested last week. She said she wouldn't rule it out, especially since she's seen some unexpected reactions to chemo from Asian patients specifically. I remembered that my old medical oncologist had said the same early on, that clinical studies generally enroll mostly white patients, and Asian patients tend to react differently. My nurse said that in her experience, Asians are more sensitive to the drugs, and their side effects can be unpredictable compared to what might be expected.
Brainstorming ideas, she brought up compression sleeves and kinesio taping, which my physical therapist has also mentioned. I figured it's good to know these options exist, but since I just started with the wrist braces and radial nerve glides, I don't need to try anything new just yet.
Even after talking for a while, I still had to wait for the pharmacy to send up the Herceptin. My infusion started around 10:30.
I left the Cancer Center just after 11:00, which means today's visit took about 2 hours. I'd been wondering if my infusion appointments might be more efficient now that I'm only getting one drug, but I guess there's still a lot of waiting around time.
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