Would anyone refuse BCG treatments?

Since BC Dx in May 2008, Ihave had two rounds of BCG: six weekly and then, 4 months later, 3 weekly maintenance. Only 1 treatment (#5) left me feeling "fluish" for 2 days. No effects from others. Recommend BCG for all unless contraindicated for some medical reason. I will definately continue BCG.

David

For my first 6 BCG treatments I had little to no effects. That was one year ago. I just started 3 maintenance treatments and have finished two of the three. With the first 2 I have had, chills, some minor bleeding (the second time), increased frequency and moderate burning. All last no longer than 1 day.

Joey

I could only tolerate 3 bcg treatments. I tried to convince my uro to try lower doses rather than stopping altogether because of the great track record that BCG has. Many, many people have no problems with it all. Unfortunately, I wasn't one of the lucky ones.

I strongly recommend getting BCG. If you have issues with it, then discuss those with your uro. They can do different strengths depending on the type of reaction you have.

In my case it was high fever and pain which meant my risk of sepsis was too high to continue even at lower doses. They put me on mitmycin, which is not nearly as good as BCG and I even had problems with that.

Best of luck with your treatment!
Mike

From what I remember from my research, the way that BCG treatments came about for bladder cancer was that a very astute Doctor way back last century noticed that TB patients do not get cancer. That is how the treatment of instilling the wash into the bladder was tried and proved.

It helps the odds and it's the best that we've got. It's been going on for years and years, it's not something new....

Good luck with your decision.

Rosemary

I agree with many of the posts here - I had two recurrences with more tumors each time (total of 16 when all said and done). Have had 6 week regimen and then have had the maintenance 3 times so far. I got really bad symptons but do a 1/3 dilution even on the maintenance. Have been cancer free for 2 years now.

I think the biggest question to ask has to do with progression. My doctor and I discussed BCG or mitomycin - BCG appears to be better at stemming progression, even if the cancer returns.

Just some food for thought - good luck with your decision. For me it seemed prudent to "do something" to fight this thing - so I go through the regular treatments, even with negative cystos and feeling good most of the time.

Ross

Of course, I have been the one to get the rare case of terrible psoriatic arthritis that was triggered by the little booster shot that BCG treatments gave to my immune system. I think the arthritis would have jumped on me someday anyway, but perhaps not so hard and not so soon.

My Doctor agrees that my reaction was the rare one.

I had to discontinue BCG after the 12th treatment. Reducing the dosage made no difference at all in my case.

Every single person is different with BCG. I'm so glad that we have this treatment. As someone said above, the treatment options could be a lot worse.

I would go for it if I were you. You've got a good chance for mild side effects...

Good luck,
Ro