Triple Negative Breast Cancer and Chemotherapy

Thank for the reminder of just who is in control of our lives - Our times are in God's hands.

hello,

Sorry to hear about your situation. I also was DX: july 2009,TN and i am 39 w/3 kids and a wonderful husband of 21 yrs.  Let me tell you what I  did. I had the DIEP Flap procedure to both breasts and thank the Lord, 12 nodes clear. Now I am faced with the oncologist that wants me to join a chemo. trial called the Tic Tac Dough...still praying about that...changing subject...I read the best book ever called "Anti Cancer, A New Way of Life" by Dr. David Servan-Schreiber(MD) it gave me so much hope and a battle plan...read Psalm 23 that gave me so much peace. Best wishes!

Janice, it is all so much to understand... at first i just did all the treatments the docs recommended, surgery/chemo/radiation- now almost 2 year out (since June 2008)..I am starting to get a grip on things and finding out more and understanding more about my diagnosis- from a more objective place.... from what i read triple negative can be bad or maybe not, after 3,4,5 years i think you have a less chance of re-ocurrance, no mater nothing we can do but live each day and pray it does not return. I did all i could to prevent a reoccurance.  I too at first thought chemo was going to help protect me, now not so sure.

Sugar77,

I had my last chemo on Oct 8th, 2009 and just finished my radiation. I had read about the women who had not had hair regrowth and yes I freaked out privately in the bathroom or up in the middle of the night by myself thinking it would not grow back BUT IT DID!!!!!! I'm still a "Chia Pet" as my kids call me but it is thick and soft! As for the chemo......A group in Indianapolis is really into tnbc and they are the ones who said the taxotere was emerging as the drug of choice for tnbc. Girl my path report said I was triple negative but they said it was medullary and said I wouldn't need chemo.......K-right.........ummmm many "second" opinions one in Boston at Dana Farber, Vanderbilt, the Mayo Clinic and the guys in Indy. The diagnoses got progressively worse until we had come 180 degrees to the ever-crappy triple negative. Sigh. Glad I did the chemo and glad you did too:) Your dx and rx are almost identical to mine. I had originally 0.9 cm but they found 0.2cm when they did the lumpectomy after the biopsy.

This is my first post. I have had a lumpectomy and radiation via mamosite.  Surgery Dec 16 2009 and Radiation Jan 25-Jan29.  There was confusion in my Testing so radiation was done first but now that I am Triple Negative I have been advised by one onc to have TC 4 times 21 days apart and by another to have TAC 6 times. 21 days apart.  The first onc says the A part is too hard on the heart. The second onc says that is because the A is given in a short time and shocks the body but if given over a 4 day period is less damaging to heart and very helpful in avoiding the cancer returning.

I am confused and would appreciate any info  anyone has on continuous infusion of the A (administered by wearing a pump over a 3 or 4 day period) as opposed to short term (one day)treatment. 

Just finished my last chemo treatment andI it worked! I was dx'd on 9/16/09 and was started right away on 4 rounds of A/C and then 4 rounds of taxotere and cisplatin...nasty stuff...tumor was originally 9cm and at least one node had cancer (through fine needle aspiration with the biopsy). My PET right before my last treatment shows 0 cancer cells, tumor and node are not showing up at all...just a little patchy infiltrate on my lung, which they think (and I hope) is just an infections clearing...will check that out on monday....now I will do a bilateral masectomy, sentinal node and rads....hopefully it will not come back ever, but I am glad that I tried chemo.

Congratulations!

Wondering where you got the information that it doesn't matter what size of tumor or nodular involvement if a person is TN...have looked everywhere for something to substantiate that and couldn't find it...My onc and breast surgeon were estatic when my nodes were clear and the tumor was smaller than expected and they both knew I was tn...

Also..if you go to life math breast cancer therapy...it sure does make a difference based on 15 years..just curious.

I think TNBC is blown out of proportion in the media.  Sure it's aggressive and, yes, there are no targeted therapies at the moment, but many many women will go on to live to a ripe old age. My onc told me my prognosis was good and I'm sticking to that. I just finished TC x4 on Feb 8th as extra insurance. 

Yes, there is an article that talks about TN spreading irrespective of nodes. I will try and located it, but it is a VERY involved article. In fact, I'll just Copy/Paste that section.

     
outcome in TNBC
survival
TNBC accounts for a disproportionate number of BC deaths;
the majority of studies indicate a negative impact of a TN (on
the basis of data of thousands of patients) or BL (defined by
a few molecular studies) phenotype on patient prognosis [17,
24, 37, 39, 44, 60–62]. In numerous randomized trials, patients
with TN [63, 64] or BL [65] tumors treated by anthracyclines
and taxanes experience a significantly decreased survival
compared with patients with other tumor types. Importantly,
the prognostic effect of TNBC is independent of poor grade,
nodal status, tumor size and treatment [44, 63]. The
aggressiveness of TNBC is further indicated by the fact that (i)
the peak risk of recurrence occurs within the first 3 years after
initial treatment of the disease with the majority of deaths
occurring in the first 5 years [18, 42] and (ii) after diagnosis of
metastatic disease, a significantly shorter survival was observed
in both BL [28] and TNBC [42, 45]. Conversely, the risk for late
recurrences (i.e. beyond 5 years of diagnosis) is decreased by
50% compared with HR-positive disease [27]. However,
differences between TNBC and non-TNBC regarding overall
survival (OS) wear off at 10 years of follow-up.
Cheang et al. recently hypothesized that the negative impact
of TNBC on survival may be affected only by the subgroup of
basal tumors within the TNBC group. Using the five-marker
method described above, patients with BL TNBC had
significantly decreased BC-specific OS compared with patients
with the remaining non-basal TNBC; among patients treated by
adjuvant anthracycline-based chemotherapy, the addition of
basal markers allowed for identification of a subgroup with
a significantly increased risk of relapse [25, 66]. These results
are in line with other studies [27], particularly in node-negative
patients [17].

Above is from the following article:

Annals of Oncology

Triple-negative breast cancer—current status and
future directions

I was told the same thing by my doctors.  What I have done is I have taken my health into my own hands: read The China Study, look into The Budwig Protocal.  These are the healthy lifestyle changes in addtion to surgery & chemo that will prolong your life.  I have given up dairy as this is the only food I was eating that could have possibly done me harm.  I have lost 20 pounds.  I am doing great with chemo due to food choices and alternative treatments.  I am going to do the Budwig Protocol which will take much discipline, but it just may save my life so for me it's worth it.  When I got this diagnosis, everyone told me: be proactive in your care.  Do your research. Ask Questions.  There is alot to learn and chemo or surgery alone never "cured" anyone.  It's up to you to do the rest.

Best of luck to you and a big hug.  You can get through this!

Mary

MBJ- I had the A. Did you?

I am finding myself very confused over the different chemo.

I had dose dense 4X AC and then 4X Taxol each followed w/ a shot of neulasta.

I am 3- and BRCA 1

I had the dose dense first, then left masectomy, then 33 rads plus 5 boosts but sometimes I wonder if they left out the kitchen sink  I am trying to eat lots of veggies and fruits also plus exercise. I am trying to lose my chemo weight.

And another thing...hopefully you don't mind the rambling..looking at that "study"..well it is what it is...some things are obviously true..with TN it doesn't seem to matter what stage you are..they throw the kitchen sink at you...payton..I had the same treatment as you but we are different stages..so yeah...things are the same...if you are TN..you get everything..which is a good thing.. no mattter what stage.but..at the same point..this is one study..WE were not in that study......and who knows what years they based this on...there are things for us coming out..right now...just like I had AC/taxol..now taxotere is the thing..and it hasn't even been a year..a co-worker had 4 ac only...6 years ago..and she is fine...more than fine...I guess you just have to put these freaking studies..away..and just go on..If you feel good and you have done everything you can..don't waste time on freaking out about studies..we have too much to LIVE for.