Thrush

My husband is on day 19 of 30 for radiation, and within just the first few days his tongue got much more sore than he would've expected at that point.  The tongue pain is worse than the throat pain and is what really prevents him from eating much.  THe radiation nurse said it was due just to the radiation, but come to find out it's pretty ugly looking and is thrush.  So now we're waiting for his MD to call back and call in a prescription.  Thank God for these message boards or I never would've known what to look out for.  Thank you everyone for posting.  He was so depressed thinking he was wimping out so early in the game.  No wonder.  Gwen

The thrush is horribly painful. Mine started about mid-way through treatment also and it made my treatment so much worse. Mine traveled down my gi tract and I vomited continuously from there on through treatment. Worst of all, my rad. onc. misdiagnosed it and gave me an antibiotic. It took me two weeks to get the correct diagnosis (from my regular oncologist). He needs diflucan and to limit the amount of sugar he consumes. Also, there is a capsule I still take called Culturelle. You can find it at places such as Wal-greens. It has the same "ingredients" that are found in yogurt. If he has a PEG, you can open the capsule and dissolve it in water so he doesn't have to swallow it. Be very, very careful with the thrush. It may take two rounds of diflucan and then it may recur. It is miserable. Hope he feels better soon.

 

On 3/17/2008 Gagirl wrote:

The thrush is horribly painful. Mine started about mid-way through treatment also and it made my treatment so much worse. Mine traveled down my gi tract and I vomited continuously from there on through treatment. Worst of all, my rad. onc. misdiagnosed it and gave me an antibiotic. It took me two weeks to get the correct diagnosis (from my regular oncologist). He needs diflucan and to limit the amount of sugar he consumes. Also, there is a capsule I still take called Culturelle. You can find it at places such as Wal-greens. It has the same "ingredients" that are found in yogurt. If he has a PEG, you can open the capsule and dissolve it in water so he doesn't have to swallow it. Be very, very careful with the thrush. It may take two rounds of diflucan and then it may recur. It is miserable. Hope he feels better soon.

Tank you so much from both of us.  He started on the diflucan -first dose just now.  Thanks for the heads up on maybe needing to go a second round.  Hope you are doing well.

My tongue got wasted too. At first they thought it was thrush, but it actually turned out to be the radiation was bouncing off of two gold crowns and cooking my tongue. If he has gold crowns, make sure that isn't happening.

Rick

Yeah, they did say the radiation was bouncing off his a couple of metal fillings, so they put in cotton before they clamped down the mask ;(, so there is that soreness, but after taking the diflucan, he finds that while it is getting more difficult to swallow, he can now eat vanilla ice cream which was intolerable just a few days ago. So the doctor says he no is convinced it was thrush. So now he has to tough out the throat pain until April 8, which is determined to do.  He still doesn't think he needs to go the PEG route, but that's still a possibility.  I don't think he should suffer if there is something that will help, but he seems so much better now that the tongue pain has at least lesssoned somewhat.   THanks for you messages - they help!  Gwen

For some the PEG tube was a saver and I would never argue against one when it is needed. For me, I just didn't want another thing to deal with so I fought hard and won. Never got one. But I did lose 20 lbs!!

R

You sound like my husband...he's open to a PEG if absolutely nec'y, but it seems that the thrush pain was worse than the throat pain has turned out to be so far...He thinks he can 'muscle through' the next 13 days of treatment and the following weeks, when he'd lost 6 pounds his doctors got really concerned, even though he said he'd like to lose 15.  We assured him this is not the way to do it, and I now fatten up everything I serve him with butter and cream and protein powder, and he gained back 2 lbs.  Now it's the mucous that's kicking in and his he's battling the awful skin problems from the cetuximab. Found that Neil Med nasal rinse has been a huge help. Like you, I think he doesn't want to have to deal with one more thing if possible.  Sounds like you're doing well, thank God.  You must be back out on the golf course by now;) Gwn

 

On 3/17/2008 Gagirl wrote:

The thrush is horribly painful. Mine started about mid-way through treatment also and it made my treatment so much worse. Mine traveled down my gi tract and I vomited continuously from there on through treatment. Worst of all, my rad. onc. misdiagnosed it and gave me an antibiotic. It took me two weeks to get the correct diagnosis (from my regular oncologist). He needs diflucan and to limit the amount of sugar he consumes. Also, there is a capsule I still take called Culturelle. You can find it at places such as Wal-greens. It has the same "ingredients" that are found in yogurt. If he has a PEG, you can open the capsule and dissolve it in water so he doesn't have to swallow it. Be very, very careful with the thrush. It may take two rounds of diflucan and then it may recur. It is miserable. Hope he feels better soon.

 

I am so glad I read your posting.  My 17 year old son is receiving radiation and chemo to treat SNUC.  He had a mild case of thrush that cleared up quickly with Nystantin, but after stopping for 2 days, it came back with a vengeance.  He started on Tuesday with Diflucan along with Percecet for pain so he can eat.  Thanks for the advice about maybe needing another course of Diflucan.