prayforamiracle
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My dad has stage 4 Sarcamatoid Carcinoma. When I have shared success stories of lung cancer patients his first response it "Yeah, but do they have my lung cancer?" I canot find any recent forums pertaining to a community of people with Sarcamatoid Carcinoma. I'd love to provide hope by any form of success beyond a year of life.
My dad has decided to start chemo after being diagnosed 4 months ago. He considers it poison. This is a big step for him and I'm grateful. He has never been a medicine person. Are there any resources or books I could recommend for someone who has not been a doctor goer? He is a very health 65 year old and never smoked.
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Reply # - July 13, 2015, 09:23 AM
Hi and welcome to Grace.
Hi and welcome to Grace.
I'm so sorry about your dad. sarcamatoid carcinoma nsclc is a rare histology and being such there isn't much in the line of gold standards for treatment. Follow is a post from Dr. West answering a very similar question as yours, "I’m sorry that I think you’re very unlikely to have anyone here who can comment on what to expect for sarcomatoid histology, since it’s so rare. Aside from the promising results in a few patients with this histology who received immunotherapies like anti-PD1 agents, there’s really no specific information about it.
Taxol (paclitaxel) is not commonly used as a maintenance therapy, since it has no proven value after 4-6 cycles and definitely leads to cumulative neuropathy.
Avastin (bevacizumab) alone is sometimes used, and it is the more studied approach after carboplatin/taxol/Avastin as first line therapy.
The hesitation about Alimta (pemetrexed) is understandable, since it definitely has some specificity for non-squamous histology and may not have activity in sarcomatoid histology…that’s just not known.
Otherwise, Tarceva (erlotinib) and Taxotere (docetaxel) have each been studied as a maintenance therapy and have some evidence for potential benefit as well. That said, there’s no established best approach in this situation."
http://cancergrace.org/topic/sarcomatoid-carcinoma-maintenance
We also have many other posts on the subject of sarcomatiod histology. This is the search result from a Grace search that may be helpful to find info, http://cancergrace.org/search-results?q=Sarcomatoid%20Carcinoma
Unfortunately there are still too few proven treatments for nsclc. Hope goes a long way and applies to more eventualities than one can imagine.
All best,
Janine