Hi Fortie,

I’m not currently undergoing treatment but I had a very positive and unusual outcome after starting EOX chemo in 2013. In late September/early October I was given a diagnosis of T3N3M1, with a very poor prognosis. 

Surgery and radio therapy were impossible due to the position of my primary which had grown around my aorta.

Apparently I was a super responder to the chemo. For years I was told it was only a matter of time before it grew back again. 

I was having six monthly then annual CT scans. Last year I asked my oncologist to view them in sequence to compare year on year. He did and then ordered a biopsys of the area. 

Amazingly, there was no detectable sign of cancer. That was six years after my diagnosis and being told I had as little as 8 weeks to live.

The only therapy I had was EOX chemo. No alternative or complementary treatments just chemo and an awful lot of good luck. 

I’d hate to raise false hope but whatever statistics doctors use are only valid for large cohorts of patients. There are always outliers, like me whose data is excluded because it skews the figures. 

Good luck!

Dave

Hi Fortie,

I’m not currently undergoing treatment but I had a very positive and unusual outcome after starting EOX chemo in 2013. In late September/early October I was given a diagnosis of T3N3M1, with a very poor prognosis. 

Surgery and radio therapy were impossible due to the position of my primary which had grown around my aorta.

Apparently I was a super responder to the chemo. For years I was told it was only a matter of time before it grew back again. 

I was having six monthly then annual CT scans. Last year I asked my oncologist to view them in sequence to compare year on year. He did and then ordered a biopsys of the area. 

Amazingly, there was no detectable sign of cancer. That was six years after my diagnosis and being told I had as little as 8 weeks to live.

The only therapy I had was EOX chemo. No alternative or complementary treatments just chemo and an awful lot of good luck. 

I’d hate to raise false hope but whatever statistics doctors use are only valid for large cohorts of patients. There are always outliers, like me whose data is excluded because it skews the figures. 

Good luck!

Dave

Hello Dave, 

Well thanks so much for taking the trouble to post, especially with such a positive message.  I am trying to be very thankful for the rersponse I have had for the treatment to oeso. cancer.   I can't help but be rather miffed that I was left, after my appraisal consultation with my NHS. oncol., feeling that the cancer had only stabilised and that the only direction of travel would be the lethal one.   I am so pleased that I was able to take a second private opinion and private PET scan which is apparently the only sure way (aside from biopsy) of distinguishing scarring after successful (non-surgical) therapy from cancer remaining after unsuccessful treatment.  I'll take the conclusion from the PET scan that my treatment has so far been successful glady, bolstered by your experience that it is possible to have a good outcome without surgery.  Thanks again for your post,  as is said, "you've made an old man very happy"!

I'm  not half as worried by the news of a cancer in my prostate.   I am now in the process of getting onto some sort of treatment path for that in the NHS initially by getting a referral from my NHS GP to a urologist.

Best wishes and good health!

Hi Davek

Congratulations on your successful treatment, Can I ask if you had squamous cell or adenocarcinoma, how big and where in the oesphagus?

My daughter has 8cm SCC tumour at the junction.

Hi Dave, I hope you all don’t mind me jumping on this thread but I’ve just posted earlier for the first time about a prognosis we were given by my dad’s oncologist on the first appointment of seeing her before any treatment had even been discussed! Unfortunately surgery was not an option for him as pet scan showed  that he also has it in the lymph node very close to the aorta. He is a fit 80 year old and has so far had 2 cycles of Folfox chemo with very minimal side effects so far & is actually now eating absolutely everything no problem with no pain. So this seems hopeful that the chemo is working. He has adenocarcinoma at the junction (T3N1M0 or M1)& symptoms started 4 months ago with pain when eating & then not being able to eat so losing lots of weight, then was diagnosed 3 months ago after an endoscopy. He has put on 9lb in weight as eating normal again. Hoping the prognosis is wrong & unsure if prognosis given is from when symptoms started or from diagnosis or from the time we first saw the oncologist. Can anyone shed any light on this. Yours is a positive message that hopefully gives a little light to others also going through this.