BREAST CANCER - BLOOD TEST AVAILABLE TO MONITOR

I am a breast cancer patient and have been amazed at how many others in my situation have not been offered a CA15-3 bloodtest every three months by their GP to monitor their cancer count when initial treatment has finished.  The reading should stay below 30. Mine was between 17-24 for around 6 yrs and in one three month period rose to 40.  My doctor noted the rise and I was sent for a CT scan which showed I had mets in my liver.  It is a useful tool rarely used and I cannot understand why.  Please ask your GP about it - so that further disease can be picked up quickly and treatment started.  Max x

Parents
  • Max,

    I am sorry to hear about your diagnosis but I am very grateful to you for sharing this information.  For anyone on here who wants to know more, I found this link from 2013: 

    scienceblog.cancerresearchuk.org/.../

    I'm shocked things like this exist and we're not offered them.  I'm still astounnded by how little support and advice I get pro-actively from the BCN team and my surgeon - I have to research and ask about everything!  I've had to call them to ask about my prosthesis fitting, I've had to fight for IVF treatment (because they didn't think it was important and there's 'plenty of time for all that'), they refuse to discuss reconstruction or a second mx with me until after radiotherapy (best guess is rads starts in July).  I asked about spread and cancer returning and they've just told me not to worry, it's not very likely!

    (Sorry about the rant, bit frustrated today)

    I will ask them about this test when I meet my oncologist tomorrow.

    xx

     

     

Reply
  • Max,

    I am sorry to hear about your diagnosis but I am very grateful to you for sharing this information.  For anyone on here who wants to know more, I found this link from 2013: 

    scienceblog.cancerresearchuk.org/.../

    I'm shocked things like this exist and we're not offered them.  I'm still astounnded by how little support and advice I get pro-actively from the BCN team and my surgeon - I have to research and ask about everything!  I've had to call them to ask about my prosthesis fitting, I've had to fight for IVF treatment (because they didn't think it was important and there's 'plenty of time for all that'), they refuse to discuss reconstruction or a second mx with me until after radiotherapy (best guess is rads starts in July).  I asked about spread and cancer returning and they've just told me not to worry, it's not very likely!

    (Sorry about the rant, bit frustrated today)

    I will ask them about this test when I meet my oncologist tomorrow.

    xx

     

     

Children
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