My gf does not want radiology. Help!

jacksam

Hello. I have a problem. Briefly my Thai gf has breast cancer. This is second time she has had cancerous small lump removed. The first time chemo etc was recommended but she skipped it. 2 years later another. Now removed and currently couple weeks away from her last chemo. (Was 4 in total). Her lymph nodes are negative. She is classed grade 2. Maybe because second time around. Also she has silicon implants. First occurance she had partial breast removal including nipple of right breast. She is 35. Living in Thailand its very hard to understand doctors.

Anyway she does not want the radio of 25 hits after last chemo. She mentioned to her surgeon just passing that she was thinking opting out of radiology. He sort of snapped that if she does then 30% chance cancer come back. She has care at great hospital but they don't explain stuff. Just tell you what needs to be done.

I'm bit desperate. Any advice welcome.

Jack

MinusTwo

The standard of care is radiation after lympectomy. I think the only time they don't recommend rads is for a total bilateral mastectomy. But if the biopsies came back with IDC - it's most common to have chemo in any case.

You'll need more data to get more thorough answers. Is she ER/PR Positive? Is she HER2 positive? What were all the spec of the first cancer? What was the stage then? What is the stage now? Is this classified as a recurrence or a metastases? How many lymph nodes have they tested? What is her Oncotype score? Has she done genetic testing?

ShetlandPony

If the doctors do not explain well, maybe your girlfriend would like to read about this treatment in her native language, or talk to another Thai woman trained to assist breast cancer patients navigate their treatment. It might be important to know the reason for her hesitation. Is it because she does not understand why the radiation therapy is necessary? Or because she is scared of the treatment? What about it scares her? Or some other reason? I did a search for "cancer society Thailand" and found a page with places you could contact for help:

http://www.cancerindex.org/Thailand

Is she interested in reading here on BCO or posting a question? If we had more particulars, we could direct her to some pages and threads.

MexicoHeather

Jack, I am going to suggest that you show her a risk calculator. You can put in the information that you know, the info on her chemo and she can visually see what the change in mortality chances are. I used this to explain things to my relatives. Go to lifemath.net it's free. It will show the benefit of radiation in terms of improvement to life expectancy, and then she can decide.

Lifemath.net/cancer/breast cancer

Also, perhaps she doesn't want to have any damage to the skin texture?

marijen

Go to DEEP REGRETS forum and see what the otherside has to say

jacksam

Thankyou ladies for those replies. I realize I need to provide more info. Her next (last) chemo is July 6. I will try and find out the details of her results. I do know it has been classed as a recurrence. She had a few nodes tested after first lump removed and had the partial breast removal. Then more tested this second time. Both times the nodes were negative. As I said earlier, on next visit I will try and obtain results. I do recall that when we first meet with oncologist after the second lump removal the surgeon that did the op discussed results together very pleased with results.

As for the radiology treatment, she is in no way nervous or worried. Also she has had almost zero side effects from CT. Yes now has a wig but is even comfortable about that. I think her hesitation may be about having to have daily treatments and perhaps cost. Expensive for us (meaning me) about $400 per treatment, 25 treatments. I assured her not to make decisions based on money concerns.

Thai in the main are very different situation to western women. Here they have doctors as god like status and you don't ask questions. Don't discuss options etc. Again thank you to the people that gave the above advice. Also the Thai link that was suggested. Hope all people dealing with this cancer in these forums a good recovery....thank you

Also big thanks to the people who started breastcancer.org . Excellent