Provenge

[hysir]

After finishing second infusion on 12-7, I had sbrt treatment on spot on rib and pelvis area. Came across an article that radiation could stimulate provenge. Third infusion was on 12-21. Felt pretty good and left doctor's office after one hour. Same symtoms with fatigue and chills. Got home, ate a light lunch and went to bed. I didn't feel too well Friday and it got worse Saturday. Called doc and he said go to emergency and he had received info from Dendreon that there might be bacteria problem. The hospital ran all sorts of blood tests and tried to grow bacteria in petri dishes. I was feeling better with all the antibiotics and other medications they were administering. Had to wait for results of the petri results before I could be released. No negative results and was released Xmas evening. Maybe it was a false positive. Got the catheter removed today. All done and will monitor how I feel until I see Oncologist.

[ctarleton]

Glad you are feeling better. When I got Provenge in 2016 I had some 2-3 day periods after the infusions where I was Really weak and tired. Not so much the chills, though.

(Hopefully, Dendreon was just covering their ass, so to speak, and wanting you to be close to medical attention just in case you might have had an infected bag of Provenge-treated cells, possibly caused by a problem with a port or PICC line, or contamination during leukapheresis, or something infecting the batch during transit or processing. So far, it seems there is Zero evidence that anything like that actually occurred.)

Good luck, and keep us posted.

Charles

[hysir in reply to ctarleton]

thanks

[Hidden]

pieces of cells can trigger immune response, and radiation can create pieces, and Provenge is vaguely classified as an immune treatment. No specific evidence from trials, that I know of, for most of this.

[hysir in reply to Hidden]

After getting radiation treatment after second infusion, came across this article-The Abscopal Effect, by Mark Scholz.