What are the common side effects of 7 plus 3 chemotherapy? So the major side effects of 7 and 3 is the suppression of blood counts. And so what we worry about the most is this patients become very dependent on transfusions. And the other thing is that they become very neutropenic. So their Y count is very low and they're very susceptible to infections. And this is where usually most of the complications come from. The other side effects in terms of how people feel is they do get nausea, can have vomiting. We typically can control all of these symptoms pretty well. We have great antinagin medications these days and they're part of the regimen. So you get the nausea medicines with the chemo like as a given. And then if you need more you get more. So we typically can control these symptoms. Patients can get diarrhea, they can get constipation. People do lose their hair. So that's definitely one of the side effects. Some people can get ulcers in their mouth and throat and that can be pretty painful. It can affect the liver function, kidney function. So all of this just needs to be monitored very closely. So overall across all drugs, almost all drugs, they universally cause what's called myelosuppression, which is lowering of patient's blood counts. And that's a universal issue and that leads to the need for blood and platelet transfusions. It immunosuppresses patients so they're at risk of getting infections. Mostly the infections they pick up are infections with bacteria that are sort of living in the environment, living on your skin. It's difficult to avoid. So low blood counts is sort of a universal side effect. With most of our drugs people can get a little bit of nausea but that nausea is usually extraordinarily well tolerated with our current anti-nausea agents. Sometimes people as a side effect of getting low blood counts will get infections, they'll end up with a fever, you'll have to go into the hospital, get intravenous antibiotics. I'd say those are the major side effects.
HealthTree • September 9, 2022