lizbethann

Hi Again, Yes, my Dad was first diagnosed with adenocarcinoma, unknown primary in 1978. The first location was his shoulder and he eventually had his arm removed. He has had 4 lung surgeries and of course they can do no more of those, he has had radiation and lung damage due to gemzar (he developed asthma). I problably didn't explain correctly about the symptoms - the two times this has happened it was before the decadron that he had loss of appetite, mental unclarity, difficulty with walking, he seemed to get short of breath. Once they treat him with decadron everything clears up and he looks almost as good as new after several days on decadron, including having a huge appetite. His brain tumors were so small that they say they didn't think were causing this type of symptom. Mainly what I was wondering is if anyone had this type of situation happen and what they diagnosed it with. Thank you all for responding, I really appreciate it.

Hi, my name is Beth and my father John has been fighting cancer off and on for 26 years. Lately it has been quite a situation. In february he was briefly in the hospital for pneumonia. About 4 weeks later he was still not quite himself, but the oxygen requirement was very very low and he seemed to be gaining strength. The Dr's. were about to begin him on chemo again. Over a period of about a week, he went downhill alot. His appetite was gone, very very lethargic, seemed much weaker until during the night at the end of that week he couldn't function physically or mentally, lost control of his bladder, couldn't walk or really even sit up. We took him to the hospital and they diagnosed him with slight hypercalcemia and then did further testing. They then found 2 extremely small brain tumors which they did not believe to be the cause for that situation however they started him on decadron and scheduled stereotactic radiosurgery to be done 10 days later. After 6 days in the hospital he was much better than I had seen him in ages and they released him. Upon getting home, he practically bounced around the house, didn't need oxygen, no asthma attacks and extremely mentally clear. (I imagine alot of the improvement was due to the decadron). He was taken off the decadron right before the brain surgery. He had the surgery on April 7 and little by little has gone back to the old problem that entered him into the hospital until yesterday when we were forced to call the ambulance again and take him into the hospital. Has anyone dealt with anything like this? They say it is not the brain tumors causing it and that his calcium level is normal. The ER doc says the CT scan showed no swelling of the brain. Please please let me know if you have any thoughts or ideas. Thank you all very much Beth

Hi, I am new to the message boards- If any of you or your family members have taken Iressa, I have 2 question, they may seem silly, but I have a reason for asking. 1. Did you have a mouth irritation ever with this drug? 2. Did you get a face rash, and if so at what point of the treatment? My father has recently begun this treatment. Thank you so much for your help!