My first experience with Taxol dose dense treatment follows two months of AC dose dense treatment and was certainly something to write about. Obviously everyone’s experience is different and I can only reflect on my experience with the drug.
Dose dense basically means that I receive the chemotherapy drugs with less time between treatments than standard chemotherapy which allows the drugs to interrupt the rapid growth phase of the tumour cells.
There has been a fair bit of research completed on the benefits of dose dense and one article in particular grabbed my attention. It is called ‘Dose Dense-Intensive Chemotherapy Improves Survival in Early Stage Breast Cancer.’ (Cancerconnect, 2020). A couple of stats within this article state that:
- Overall survival was improved by nearly 30% among the women treated with dose-dense chemotherapy.
- At 10 years, survival for women with hormone-negative breast cancer (cancer that is not stimulated to grow from exposure to female hormones) was improved by 35% among those treated with dose-dense chemotherapy, compared to those treated with standard-dose chemotherapy.
So with stats like that, I felt confident going into my first treatment of taxol dose dense.
The night before my treatment I was given five tablets of a drug which was to help prevent an allergic reaction. This medication made me feel like I was over stimulated and buzzing. I got about two hours of sleep that night and had massive night sweats. My body was not a fan of these preventative drugs. I then had to have another five tablets the morning of treatment and once again, I felt like I was buzzing and was extremely sweaty. When I got to oncology and they took my resting heart rate it was sitting at 100bpm.
I was at oncology for 4.5hrs and had my dose dense taxol treatment without an allergic reaction which was good news. I felt pretty good leaving the hospital, although a bit nervous not knowing what to expect with this treatment. The rest of the day was pretty good as I could still feel the effects of the preventative drugs keeping me going.
The next day I awoke with an extremely red face. It felt hot and looked nasty but wasn’t too bad. I calmed it down with some cream.
I spent the day out in nature exploring with my family and felt pretty good. That was until I crashed and burned that night. May have pushed myself a bit too much and it caught up with me. I had a sleep mid afternoon and went to bed reasonably early.
The next day (day 3) is when things start to unravel. Every bone and joint in my body was aching; I had the beginnings of neuropathy in my fingers and feet; I was feeling itchy under my arms and on my chest and upon investigation realised I had a rash covering my top half of my torso; I was tired; my eyes ran like taps and had the usual belly pain and bowel issues. I took panadol and an antihistamine but neither took the edge off the pain or the itch. I was miserable. This lasted for the another four days and I was unable to contact the nurses or oncologist or my local doctor as it was over Easter holiday and ANZAC day period. I basically laid on the couch or in my bed and slowly waited for the day to be over. I had no energy to do anything.
I finally managed to get hold of my nurse who sorted out some medication for the skin rash. This was day 7 and the bone and joint pain had settled by then. A few days of taking the meds and the skin rash stopped being so nasty and settled down finally giving me relief. All I have been left with is the neuropathy.
The neuropathy is worse in my fingers as my fingertips feel numb and my nails feel like someone has hit them with a hammer and feel bruised. I am struggling to do lots of fine motor control things like put on socks, unscrew lids, take my bank card out of my wallet. Simple little things are a struggle. My feet were really sore to begin with but once the joint pain settled they have had more like constant pins and needles but not too bad. Neuropathy is something that needs close monitoring as it can have long term effects. It’s finding a balance between how much taxol to give without effecting quality of life after fighting the cancer.
My experience with the first round of taxol dose dense wasn’t the best. At least I have bounced back and had a few good days towards the end of this cycle. I am really hoping that the toxicity in my system doesn’t keep building up and getting to a point of an allergic reaction worse than my skin rash. I only have three more rounds of chemo to go and then I am finished and can look towards healing ready for surgery. The finish line is in sight.
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