Oh heck Basing that's really tough.

A lot of us have lost partners and parents less commonly are people facing loosing a child it must be really difficult. When my wife died people told me that it was the hardest thing to cope with and I always told them I thought that losing a child would be harder hoping I'd never have to face that.

There was a lot of cancer in my wife's family - genetic issue. Her brother got on a trial for immunotherapy, didn't work too well for him I'm afraid, it made him worse.

With my wife she was very fit throughout and towards the end when we were running out of options we went to the Royal Marsden to talk to them about clinical trials.

As it happened although she was fit her blood figures were not high enough to go on trials. Sometimes the oncologists will bend the rules a bit on whether you can have treatment or not but they're very strict on trials.

Th other issue was that a lot of the interest they have was around the interaction with sugars and cancers and the fact that Mel was diabetic ruled her out of a number of the trials - not all of them but many. The blood numbers was the barrier though.

Many of the trials are double blind which means that half the participants or maybe a third don't get the drug but a placebo - although none at the Marsden that we were considered for were of that type - everybody got the experimental drug.

They were straight up though - they told us that really only about 1 in 10 people actually saw any benefit from the trials - but at that stage we were getting to aproved drugs that had something like 1 in 7 effectiveness so that was less of a concern and if your daughters out of options I guess she'd probably feel the same too.

You obviously have to look at where the trial is in the country and how many visits are needed and any other criteria but the cancer research trials page is here.

www.cancerresearchuk.org/.../find-a-clinical-trial

I don't see appendix cancer but I'd think stonmach cancer would be similar and there are these for secondary cancers spread to the lungs

www.cancerresearchuk.org/.../clinical-trials-search

Of these only 1 is really a treatment for the cancer

www.cancerresearchuk.org/.../a-trial-of-radiotherapy-for-cancer-that-has-spread-to-another-part-of-the-body-sabr-comet

Which is a radiotherapy - Looks like London and Glasgow and there are obviously a list of qualifying criteria.

Maybe discuss with her oncologist whether she might be suitable to refer to clinical trials?

Best of luck - hope this is of some help

Hello basing,

A warm welcome to our forum. I hope you will find the support you need here in this difficult time. You sound like a wonderful mother and I am sure it means a lot to your daughter to have you by her side.

Feel free to give our nurses a call on 0808 800 4040 - their number is free from UK landlines and you can call them Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm. It might do you some good to talk to them.

Best wishes,

Lucie, Cancer Chat Moderator