Hello,
My grandfather was diagnosed with stage 4 nsc lung carcinoma in April 2015. Biopsy proved EGFR mutation positive. He was started on afatinib then, and fortunately it has been working well. His last PET scan done in February 2016 came out clean.
Unfortunately afatinib is working out too expensive. . . Already had to take a lot of loans to cover some of these months.
His oncologist has not been clear on how long we shall need to use it. Is it lifelong?
Is there an option of going down to erlotinib or geftinib?
Perhaps in hindsight we should have made all these queries at time of commencing treatment . . But the time of diagnosis was a very scary period for us. And we just went along with suggestions provided.
Any information given will be really appreciated.
Thank u
Can we downgrade from afatinib - 1289680
uz13
![]()
Posts:1
Forums
Reply # - January 2, 2017, 09:43 AM
Hi and welcome to Grace. It's
Hi and welcome to Grace. It's absolutely wonderful to know he is doing well, that's great and now we must get help paying for it or something similar. It's all too common/the norm to have little to no knowledge of cancer care when a cancer diagnosis is made. You want to do what's best and there's no way to know everything. I'm sorry you grandfather and family had to take out loans for treatment. Moving forward know that there are often grants given by drug companies that can help with treatment costs. I was in a tizzy for a few days when we got the co pay info on a drug my husband took, but found a workaround (I think it was a grant from the drug co) through the financial adviser at the cancer center.
Check to see if there is an adviser at your grandfather's cancer center who can help. A call directly to the drug company is also very appropriate. There are clearinghouses that do nothing but help people acquire prescribed drugs and it's possible that the drug company goes through the clearinghouses.
It's possible that your grandfather will do very well on tarceva or iressa as well so a change would be appropriate if he isn't able to get financial help.
This is a serious problem, only about 1% of the population could be expected to pay the price often asked for by the pharmacutical companies. Please don't hesitate to ask for assistance.
Keep us posted and all best to you and your family.
Janine