How about women over 70

Nana - first of all - tell your oncology people that you will only accept the infusion over 60 minutes - FOR EACH DRUG. "They" love running them in only 30 minutes each. I believe Special K and I agree increasing the time made the biggest difference. I had very few side effects once I made them drag it out for 60+ minutes. Of course you will need to sit there longer, but what's another hour in the scheme of things once we over 70? But I still needed more hydration. If they're not giving you a 'bag' of Saline during each infusion, that's another thing you can request to change. Where I was treated the doc had to submit orders to the infusion center for this to happen.

Nope - no information. After you fill in "my profile" you have to select "make my information public" for it to be available.

If you have specific questions for Special K, you can do a private message - see the left side of the screen. Or you can 'search members' and send a private message from there.

Hello Docy. First, I'm so sorry you are having such a rough time of it. Second, please don't apologize... feel free to complain all you need to. We all get it. I have no experience with Kadcyla but it sounds unpleasant. Is it possible to have a dose reduction?

Sorry I can't offer any advice of value, but I want you to know that I saw your post. Take care.

Lw and Minus two,

Thank you for your reply and support.

I had a residual disease in one lymph node and so I’m on Kadcyla.

Got the second opinion .

The dose is already reduced , will see how I do this cycle.

This is, and believe me,, I totally know it really is not, sort of funny to me because you all seem so young. I'll be 88 in April. BC is the one thing I never feared because of having ovaries removed, due to a very rare form of cervical cancer in 1969 when I was 35. I was given less than a 20% chance of living for two years. After the two years I did do estrogen only HRT. I was stunned and traumatized by my diagnosis 3 years ago. Had re-excision lumpectomy on my 85th birthday. Then 16 accelerated partial radiation treatments . Have been on Arimidex since June 2019. No libido, a little hair thinning, stiffness. But it's hard to tell whether its Arimidex, age, or walking 10-12,000 steps a day. For the past 3 months have had left knee pain, buckling leg, which certainly makes walking difficult. Arimidex? See MO Monday for 6 months checkup. Always scared before. Will discuss knee pain. Want to continue walking, travel, appreciating every day.

Re the original question as to when do you call it quits, I just called it quits on Tamoxifen. At 81, after three different "breaks", the side effects were coming back faster each time and truly interfering with my ability to accomplish anything. I have projects I still want to complete and know that at my age I have a finite amount of time in which to complete them. With my doctor's blessing ("quality of life is important") I quit taking Tamoxifen after 3 and 1/2 years. That was about 6 weeks ago and I am feeling much more like my old self and have some projects underway again. This is my story and my decision and like almost every thing else in this cancer journey is specific to me and not necessarily appropriate for anyone else!

Diagnosed at 76, radiation not recommended due to age and stage. Due to ongoing dental procedures, took Tamoxafin for only 5 months. I made the decsion to quit with approval of MO because: side effects were a double dose of old age plus the appetite of an athelite (quality of life) ,and a new study presented at Oncoloy meeting June 2021. This study addressed hormone therapy effectiveness in older women with a newly created Mammoprint risk catagory. I chose to roll the dice at an 8% risk of return/metastasis versis 4% with Tamoxofin. I now feel much better like I did prior to the hormone therapy. I am very fortunate to have been diagnosed very early: found on routine mammogram after never having an abnormal MG, the lump was never felt even by the surgeon. I am a big advocate of routine MG even in old age. However, if my risk of return were higher, I would still be on Tamoxafen. As to how much higher I do not know.

Jinnynh, this reply is delayed but I just saw this thread. Memorial Sloane Kettering has a nomogram for predicting recurrence for DCIS; https://nomograms.mskcc.org/breast/ductalcarcinoma...

74nowarranty, I was diagnosed at 69 but had radiation because of larger tumor size and lymphovascular invasion. I'm also rolling the dice with worse odds than yours by skipping the estrogen blockers. I am already dealing with arthritis and osteoporosis which would be made worse by the AIs, and I found an Italian study that showed while the incidence of DVTs from tamoxifen is in general about 2%, it was much higher in women over 70. When I showed my MO the paper and let him know I didn't want to risk being unable to walk 3 miles a day to keep the joint/bone problems at bay, he supported me. Studies have shown that 2.5 hours of weekly exercise reduces the risk of recurrence by more than 50%. Also, if I had a recurrence and survival became more important than QOL, I could use the AIs then. I'm at peace with my decision.

Everyone is in a unique situation and needs to pay attention to the standards of care but do what is best for them. I have heard some older women with bc say that they feel brushed aside by doctors who figure that death after 70 is to be expected. I let any doctor who hints at that know that my parents/grandparents lived to be over 90 (one to 103,) and at my age I still have a living uncle (97) and aunt (94.) There are no guarantees, but there are no certainties either.