Hi
my new wife (of four weeks) was diagnosed with stage 4 ovarian cancer. She has just had her 2nd round of chemo and is once again curled up in bed in pain sleeping off the effects of morphine sulphate.....
i cannot express my frustration, there just isn't the words...
we decided three years ago after I had a health scare with pneumonia and sepsis that we would sell up, buy a motorhome and travel Europe, we are fairly young (my wife is 53 and I'm 55) and lucky enough to be able to do this.
we come back to the Uk early after a month trip to Spain as my wife was not eating, losing weight fast and had no energy, after a blood test she was rushed into hospital and was given the dreaded diagnosis.
surgery was immediately ruled out and the panic for treatment stopped, after I lost my patience and phoned asking for an update and an idea of what was happening we were given an appointment to see a consultant and a date for her first chemo session - she is having the seeemingly standard treatment carboplatin and paclitaxel.
The only prognosis we got was probably years.... and that surgery was out of the question.
after the first session of chemo, day 4 my wife was rushed into hospital again with a high temperature and was found to be neutropenic (0.49) and anaemic, she was given 3 units of blood, plasma, antibiotics and fluid - 7 days later once again she was back in with a high temperature, it was a serious battle to find her an isolation room as I was worried she would be neutropenic again, luckily she wasn't (18) but once again after diagnosing an infection she was given antibiotics and plasma, the third week wasn't too bad and she had a couple of good days.
after the 2nd session (Tuesday just gone, it would have been Monday but she had a power port inserted as her veins are pretty none existent) she has gone downhill fairly fast, the problem seems to be with her passing urine and bowel movements, whilst I understand the bowel movements are relative to the amount of food eaten and she isn't eating much at all these days, she is drinking loads of fluids (as advised) her pelvis area is bloated and very painful, she doesn't complain about pain when she is passing urine but says that she has a tingling feeling when she goes, but the pain is just too much for her. Her temperature and blood pressure are absolutely fine and she says that in herself and in every other way she is fine.
once again she is not eating and is very emotional and in a lot of pain. I desperately wanted some advice so rang the ward at the hospital to seek advice as to what I should do next, they seemed annoyed that I had bothered them as they were busy (tgey had originally advised me to phone if I had any concerns) and suggested. That I took her to A&E or went to see our GP.
went to the GP and he was concerned with the amount of codeine that she was taking as that could cause constipation, he carried out an anal examination (which obviously didn't go down too well with my already upset wife) she had a urine test which showed blood and white cells in her urine, but after another blood test the oncology doctor said she wasn't too concerned... the GP suggested changing her dose of 60mg of codeine every four hours with 5mg (5ml) of morphine sulphate, taking movicol every 4 hours with senakot at night and a pessary when she feels she needs to go - this after saying that she was not compacted after the anal examination.... I feel that his lack of knowledge and expertise in the area of ovarian cancer may not be helping.... So I decided to do a little online reading up (probably not a good idea) I went to the cancer research Uk site and read all about blockages in the bowel and ascites - neither of which have been suggested or previously discussed....
cancer treatment seems like a cattle market, I trust the hospital specialist and respect their suggestions for treatment but feel that not enough is disclosed and I feel that there is no patient involmwnt in treatment options...
feeling angry, upset and very, very frustrated as well as totally knackered.
