Damage to throat after port

Mominatorpooh

Hi, I have not been diagnosed with cancer but my mom was as well as 2 of her sisters. I believe her cancer was dcis in 1 breast, hormone positive and in her lymph nodes. She had chemo done thru a port, bilateral mastectomy and radiation. I myself started having lumps biopsies and removed starating at about age 35 (mom was 57 I believe when diagnosed ) which finally resulted in a biopsy coming back as atypical and with the guidance of my mom's cancer surgeon, decided to have a bilateral mastectomy myself. My questions for all of you are if you had problems in your thoat after either port placement or removal? Mom is so far a 5 year survivor but has had problems with her throat that seem to be getting worse. When the port was placed she kept feeling like she had a lump in her that and would clear her throat almost constantly. She of course had the port removed but now has had problems choking when she never really had before. I almost had to call 911 on Thanksgiving due to her almost losing consciousness because she choked so badly. Of course 1 of my fears is now throat cancer since it seems to be getting worse and some of her blood draw #'s spiked earlier this year. They are scheduling an endoscopy procedure but not till after the 1st of the year so I am hoping some of you might have been thru the same situations and can help.

exbrnxgrl

Sorry to hear about your mom’s throat problems. If your mom had positive lymph nodes and chemo, she did not have dcis, which is non-invasive and not treated with chemo. IDC, perhaps but that’s neither here nor there with respect to her throat problems.

The throat is not typically where one finds breast cancer metastasis so try not to dwell on that. As a matter of fact, I don’t recall it ever being mentioned on this forum. I know that waiting is the worst, but the endoscopy will hopefully provide your mother with some answers and relief! Wishing you and your family the best

oxygen18

If your mom's surgery and port insertion happened around same time several years ago, it is possible the throat discomfort might be from older techniques of intubation for general anesthesia. I hope the endoscopy leads to an effective treatment.

NotVeryBrave

I developed really bad gastritis and esophagitis while on chemo. One of the side effects of that was feeling like I had a lump in my throat and problems with swallowing. My MO put me on Omeprazole and Carafe and they helped tremendously. Has your mother tried any OTC medications for stomach acid?

Mominatorpooh

I will have to look back at her files but I do belive it was dcis but the Dr's were perplexed because it didn't "act" like the type of cancer it was diagnosed as. All if her treatments were approx 4 years ago so I'm not sure any if those treatments would work now however we will look into that. Thank you!

Mominatorpooh

I will have to look back at her files but I do belive it was dcis but the Dr's were perplexed because it didn't "act" like the type of cancer it was diagnosed as. All if her treatments were approx 4 years ago so I'm not sure any if those treatments would work now however we will look into that.

Not necessarily thinking its cancer and not necessarily metastasized from the breast cancer. There are other risk factors that coukd point to cancer however. She is a smoker eventhough she quit for awhile, she is smoking again but also cancer is pretty prevalent in her side of the family. Her father had multiple cancers including colon cancer, 1 of her sisters had uterine cancer, 1 of her brothers had metastatic cancer but not sure exactly where it started by the time they found it he was so bad that he died within the week. So because of all the family history as well as losing my dad in 2017 to lung cancer and multiple myeloma, we try to stay very vigilant when things arise. They also have done extended blood work on her that we won't have the results till later this week. So it's just a nerve racking waiting game for now.