CancerCompass message board discussion started by mamamar on 4/17/2008 http://www.cancercompass.com/message-board/message/all,23139,0.htm Mon, 01 Dec 2008 00:00:00 GMT Mon, 01 Dec 2008 00:00:00 GMT http://backend.userland.com/rss RSS.NET: http://www.rssdotnet.com/ My husband has had problems with small intestinal blockages. They are happening about very two weeks. then its nothing, no food, for 24 hours and then liquids but this doesn't seem to be helping, not sure whats causing it. Drs. don't want to operate because he is on avastin, not a good canidate. my question is If he continues like this could his bowel or small intestines burst or deteriorate? Drs. won't answer my question. My husband has had colon cancer for 5 years he was in stage 4 when found, so so far he is doing well and able to work everyday. it has moved to his liver now but he is still working and doing well. I am now worried about this latest thing, bowel obstruction. mamamar Thu, 17 Apr 2008 00:00:00 GMT Dear mamamar,This must be very frustrating for you and your husband.  I'm sorry I don't have any info for you on the specifics of blockages but I think the doctor owes you some answers.  Have you discussed this with the surgeon as well as the oncologist?  I would schedule an appointment with the doctor.  Inquire about all options such as having a scan (if he hasn't had one lately) so you'll have updated info on what is going on, and the possibility of postponing his avastin (?) so surgery can be done.   Explain that you need to know what the plan is to handle future blockages.  Perhaps you have done these things already.  If so, maybe it's time to seek a second opinion.   Good luck.Lynn         2ndtimer Thu, 17 Apr 2008 00:00:00 GMT  On 4/17/2008 mamamar wrote:My husband has had problems with small intestinal blockages. They are happening about very two weeks. then its nothing, no food, for 24 hours and then liquids but this doesn't seem to be helping, not sure whats causing it. Drs. don't want to operate because he is on avastin, not a good canidate. my question is If he continues like this could his bowel or small intestines burst or deteriorate? Drs. won't answer my question. My husband has had colon cancer for 5 years he was in stage 4 when found, so so far he is doing well and able to work everyday. it has moved to his liver now but he is still working and doing well. I am now worried about this latest thing, bowel obstruction.Hi -Do you know or did the doctors say what's causing the blockage?  My husband has colon cancer stage IV with mets to his liver.  Had the tumor removed from his Colon last August and in March of this year we found out he has a partial obstruction due to reoccurence of the cancer in his small intestines.  He's been in and out of the hospital 3x in less than a month.  In really bad pain and weak due to not being able to eat and only on liquid and soft diet.  He's lost so much weight and I requested for a TPN so he can get some nutrition through IV.  Unfortunately surgery is not an option to treat the obstruction as they are located in various places, so only chemo is an option.  Frandrick Thu, 17 Apr 2008 00:00:00 GMT  On 4/17/2008 Frandrick wrote: On 4/17/2008 mamamar wrote:My husband has had problems with small intestinal blockages. They are happening about very two weeks. then its nothing, no food, for 24 hours and then liquids but this doesn't seem to be helping, not sure whats causing it. Drs. don't want to operate because he is on avastin, not a good canidate. my question is If he continues like this could his bowel or small intestines burst or deteriorate? Drs. won't answer my question. My husband has had colon cancer for 5 years he was in stage 4 when found, so so far he is doing well and able to work everyday. it has moved to his liver now but he is still working and doing well. I am now worried about this latest thing, bowel obstruction.Hi -Do you know or did the doctors say what's causing the blockage?  My husband has colon cancer stage IV with mets to his liver.  Had the tumor removed from his Colon last August and in March of this year we found out he has a partial obstruction due to reoccurence of the cancer in his small intestines.  He's been in and out of the hospital 3x in less than a month.  In really bad pain and weak due to not being able to eat and only on liquid and soft diet.  He's lost so much weight and I requested for a TPN so he can get some nutrition through IV.  Unfortunately surgery is not an option to treat the obstruction as they are located in various places, so only chemo is an option.   The Drs. are not sure if its a tumor or scar tissue, they do not want to do a ct scan at this time because he has had to many recently said it would cause more damage than good. The surgeon said he could fix the problem with surgery if he wasn't on avastin, mentioned this to the ocologist he doesn't want to take him off, My husband has decided to quit the chemo for a while, so if necessary he can have the surgery. We were told that chemo makes the blockages worse. My husband was also stage 4 when he was diagnosed 5 years ago. it has moved to his liver, from his colon. at this time he is not a good canidate for surgery, the new chemo they are giving him has a lot of bad side effects, so he is giving it up. not sure what to do right now. mamamar Fri, 18 Apr 2008 00:00:00 GMT Sounds like you should get a second opinion.  The Oncologist seems to think Avastin is necessary right now.  Rather than go off the Chemo it might be best to get 2nd opinion on that issue  ASAP.  Avastin kills the blood vessels that feed the tumor and is targeted to do just that. Arnold Fri, 18 Apr 2008 00:00:00 GMT  On 4/18/2008 mamamar wrote: On 4/17/2008 Frandrick wrote: On 4/17/2008 mamamar wrote:My husband has had problems with small intestinal blockages. They are happening about very two weeks. then its nothing, no food, for 24 hours and then liquids but this doesn't seem to be helping, not sure whats causing it. Drs. don't want to operate because he is on avastin, not a good canidate. my question is If he continues like this could his bowel or small intestines burst or deteriorate? Drs. won't answer my question. My husband has had colon cancer for 5 years he was in stage 4 when found, so so far he is doing well and able to work everyday. it has moved to his liver now but he is still working and doing well. I am now worried about this latest thing, bowel obstruction.Hi -Do you know or did the doctors say what's causing the blockage?  My husband has colon cancer stage IV with mets to his liver.  Had the tumor removed from his Colon last August and in March of this year we found out he has a partial obstruction due to reoccurence of the cancer in his small intestines.  He's been in and out of the hospital 3x in less than a month.  In really bad pain and weak due to not being able to eat and only on liquid and soft diet.  He's lost so much weight and I requested for a TPN so he can get some nutrition through IV.  Unfortunately surgery is not an option to treat the obstruction as they are located in various places, so only chemo is an option.   The Drs. are not sure if its a tumor or scar tissue, they do not want to do a ct scan at this time because he has had to many recently said it would cause more damage than good. The surgeon said he could fix the problem with surgery if he wasn't on avastin, mentioned this to the ocologist he doesn't want to take him off, My husband has decided to quit the chemo for a while, so if necessary he can have the surgery. We were told that chemo makes the blockages worse. My husband was also stage 4 when he was diagnosed 5 years ago. it has moved to his liver, from his colon. at this time he is not a good canidate for surgery, the new chemo they are giving him has a lot of bad side effects, so he is giving it up. not sure what to do right now.Hi - Hmmm, I'm not sure if chemo makes blockages worse.  Maybe in depends on each cases, but for my husband since the tumors are causing his blockage, chemo is the only option to treat the blockage to shrink the tumors so food can pass.  You should still push for a cat scan.  Because with my husband, it was too late when we found the tumors that was causing the blockage therefore surgery was not an option anymore due to the location of the tumors.  He actually had a cat scan at the end of january and everything looked good, until March when I ended rushing him to the emergency and they took another scan and showed that the cancer has spread in various places in his small intestine.  Frandrick Fri, 18 Apr 2008 00:00:00 GMT Sorry to hear that your husband has this blockage problem.  I was on Avastin before and have partial blockage since November last year.  The frequency of blockage was going up (from once a month, to once every 2 weeks, then once every week) as time goes by.  I end up in the hospital, and the doctors were trying to wait it out (let the system clear) rather than doing blockage survery because of the Chemo.  However, when blockage happen again (with soft food diet only) in the hospital, blockage surgery was done.  I am now out of the hospital and has started the Chemo again.  Basically if if the frequency of vomiting (throwing up) due to blockage is too frequent, it is impratical to continue the Chemo until the blockage part is fixed.  In order to determine that, I have CT scan to determine the blockage area, so that the surgeon knows exactly what need to be done.  I have many PET scans and CT scans before the blockage surgery.  It is true that X-ray can cause an increase of likelyhood of other cancers later, however the increase risk is still way below 1%.  You may want to get a second opinion from a surgeon about the scan.  Continue Chemo without taking care of the blockage may not be the right way to go. NYpatient51 Sun, 20 Apr 2008 00:00:00 GMT  On 4/20/2008 NYpatient51 wrote:Sorry to hear that your husband has this blockage problem.  I was on Avastin before and have partial blockage since November last year.  The frequency of blockage was going up (from once a month, to once every 2 weeks, then once every week) as time goes by.  I end up in the hospital, and the doctors were trying to wait it out (let the system clear) rather than doing blockage survery because of the Chemo.  However, when blockage happen again (with soft food diet only) in the hospital, blockage surgery was done.  I am now out of the hospital and has started the Chemo again.  Basically if if the frequency of vomiting (throwing up) due to blockage is too frequent, it is impratical to continue the Chemo until the blockage part is fixed.  In order to determine that, I have CT scan to determine the blockage area, so that the surgeon knows exactly what need to be done.  I have many PET scans and CT scans before the blockage surgery.  It is true that X-ray can cause an increase of likelyhood of other cancers later, however the increase risk is still way below 1%.  You may want to get a second opinion from a surgeon about the scan.  Continue Chemo without taking care of the blockage may not be the right way to go.My wife was diagonsed in Dec of 06 with stage III colon cancer. She had a resection of the colon followed by 10 rounds of chemo (5FU, Folfox, and avastin.)  She had a 10mm spot on her liver that reduced to less than 3mm. However, the whole time she had a ovarian cyst that developed and got larger. She went for another surgery in Jan '08 to have the cyst removed. At that time they saw flat nodules on the outside of her small intestine. She had been getting sick every couple of months and they could not find the cause. This was even BEFORE she started chemo. She went back into the hospital on 2/19/08 for severe stomach pain. At that time they did a CT scan and said she had a blockage in the small intestine. And because she could not eat, they would not do chemo. Adolph Sun, 04 May 2008 00:00:00 GMT