Categories
Multiple Myeloma Treatment

Cancer and CBD Oil

neuropathy feet

No matter what any CBD zealot tells you, CBD oil will not treat or help your actual cancer in any way. However, CBD can help many of the side-effects you get from from cancer.

I have multiple myeloma, a blood cancer. Like many of my fellow myeloma warriors, our cancer causes pain. CBD oil helps pain in some cases, but not all. It’s important to find out if CBD oil will really work for you.

Recommend CBD Oil for Neuropathy

One common reason to for cancer patients needing CBD oil is the pain caused by neuropathy. Neuropathy exists outside of the cancer population as well and has numerous causes. For cancer patients CBD is typically needed after chemotherapy causes neuropathy.

Neuropathy pain is tricky to treat. Some patients respond very well to some treatments, while others don’t respond to similar treatment. I take gabapentin three times a day. I know others who take higher or lower doses. Gabapentin is well tolerated in most people, so oncologists have no problem kicking up the dosage.

Sometimes though, even high doses of gabapentin don’t help. For me, the gabapentin helps quite a bit, but I still have significant pain in my feet. As you can imagine, this is limiting when it comes to being able to walk long distances or stand in line. This is a particular problem for my desired cancer comeback trip to Disneyworld and Universal Studio.

My physical therapist recommended CBD oil, but only after saying check with your doctor first. My oncologist said it was a good idea, and couldn’t hurt.

CBD Oil and Neuropathy

I live in Colorado where CBD oil, and marijuana itself are legal. It’s pretty easy to come by, maybe too easy. Both my PT and my doc warned me that CBD oil is not well regulated, and many oils are mostly just oil.

The solution is to buy CBD oil from a dispensary, instead of Amazon, or the back of the grocery store. The catch is that once I got to a marijuana dispensary, the very knowledgeable, and very honest, sales person informed me that to actually penetrate into the nerves and help with neuropathy, I would need higher concentrations than available as “recreational marijuana.” What I needed was “medical marijuana.”

I didn’t realize there was a difference other than licensing and taxes.

Effective CBD Oil and Neuropathy

The salesperson (excuse me, “budtender”) also recommended a tincture of at least 2,000. (I forgot the units). This got me wondering:

  • a) is CBD oil really effective for neuropathy?
  • b) if CBD oil is effective for neuropathy what dose is required?
  • c) is CBD oil not effective for neuropathy?
  • d) if CBD oil is not effective for neuropathy what is?

Like most people my first instinct was to Google. The top several results were dubious at best, composed of phony colleges, institutes, and organizations. Fortunately, the NIH was there to save the day.

The NIH, or National Institute of Health is a government organization that offers actual research studies on numerous topics, including legitimate CBD oil research and real CBD for neuropathy research included. Of course, this result is half way down the page, because the NIH does not spend big money and time on using SEO to rank highly for CBD topics.

Real CBD Oil for Neuropathy Research

One of the results I found was about the effectiveness of topical CBD oil on neuropathy of the lower extremities. In other words, does rubbing CBD oil on your feet help neuropathy pain?

There are two important things this true research about CBD oil for neuropathy in the feet tells us. The first is that yes, it does help neuropathy pain. Second, it tells us what dose they used. Most published research happens after the scientists involved already put some effort into the parameters. In other words, they already had and idea of what does would work for neuropathy of the feet. The does in the study was 250 mg CBD/3 fl. oz.

This means I’m looking for that dosage of CBD oil to be effective on foot neuropathy. Where do you find CBD oil for neuropathy and what does it cost? Most importantly, does CBD oil work for neuropathy from chemo?

I’m getting ready to find out. I’ll let you know.

Categories
Living with Myeloma

Alpha-Lipoic Acid and Neuropathy

alpha lipoic acid
Alpha-lipoic acid helps with neuropathy according to studies.

Chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy (CIPN) is a frequent side effect in cancer patients. For multiple myeloma, Velcade is a primary cause of neuropathy for patients receiving the traditional triplet cocktail of Revlimid, Velcade, and dexamethasone. Neuropathy from stem cell transplants is also common in multiple myeloma patients. In this case, stemming from the powerful dose of melphalan, or other chemo used to kill off the immune system as part of ASCT.

Peripheral neuropathy manifests in many different ways. For me, the Velcade caused increasing pain in my fingertips, and then hands, before I basically insisted they stop giving it to me. The melphalan, on the other hand, has given me neuropathic pain in my feet since my transplant.

You may wish to talk with your doctor. There are prescriptions for neuropathy that are available from your oncologist.

Alpha-lipoic acid and neuropathy

A 1999 study suggested that alpha lipoic acid (ALA), which is a natural antioxidant, helped patients with diabetic neuropathy.

Diabetic neuropathy is different in some ways that CIPN. But, a different 1998 study suggested that did work for CIPN that was not from patients treated with Taxane. (Melphalan is not Taxane)

On the other hand, this 2020 study review says that there isn’t a lot of evidence for ALA being effective for CIPN. What it does say is that glutamine and omega-3 fatty acids were potentially effective treatments.

So, why am I trying ALA anyway?

Check out my SoFi review.

A lot of people in the multiple myeloma community swear by it, and not all CIPN is equal. Studies show that the neurotoxicity caused by oxaliplatin and cisplatin are not responsive to ALA. But, I never used any of those. Those are both for treating non-myeloma cancers.

Ideally, I would like to see more recent studies with more positive results, but they just aren’t out there. Fortunately, ALA is easy to find and not expensive. If it doesn’t work for me. I will just stop taking it. But, if it does, then maybe I won’t have to try so hard to get the right dose of pregabalin for myself.

I’ll keep you posted.

Categories
Living with Myeloma

Neuropathy Treatments for Myeloma

myeloma neuropathy prescriptions

Multiple Myeloma Neuropathy Treatments

A lot of multiple myeloma patients will experience neuropathy. Peripheral neuropathy (peripheral just means at the extremities like your hands and feet) is caused by chemotherapy for myeloma patients.

Velcade is one of the main neuropathy culprits for myeloma patients. Another is the melphalan used for stem cell transplants in treading multiple myeloma.

If you are in pain, or the numbness has gotten out of hand, do not stay silent. There are neuropathy prescriptions your doctor can give you.

The catch is that not everyone has the same neuropathy, and not everyone responds the same to each medicine. That means that you might have to try a few different neuropathy medicines and doses before you find the right combination for you.

neuropathy prescriptions

Unfortunately, there is no cure for neuropathy, and the treatments can be iffy. That doesn’t mean that there is nothing that can be done.

Gabapentin

Originally, I was prescribed Gabapentin. Keep your doctor up to date on how you are feeling. As it turns out, you can go up to pretty high doses of gabapentin, so long as your body will tolerate it. So, if you are still in pain, tell your doctor. If they don’t offer, specifically ask about increasing your dosage.

Your oncologist’s job is to keep you alive. You are responsible for the quality of that life.

Over time, I seem to have gotten all of the relief I could from gabapentin. It felt like the gabapentin stopped working for me, although I’m sure the reality is that I would have been much worse off without any. Either way, I wanted to get more improvement.

Pregabalin

Pregabalin is the generic name for Lyrica. Unfortunately, Lyrica is still under patent. That means it is expensive. For this reason, your doctor will likely look to this as a treatment last, even though it may work better for many myeloma patients.

Your oncologist will have you step up your dosage over time for two reasons. One, is to ensure that you tolerate the medication. You don’t want pills making you worse. Myeloma already gives you plenty to worry about.

The second reason is to get an idea of what the minimum dose is that works for you. For me, the best dosage seems to be 400 mg per day.

Neuropathy Medication Costs

Gabapentin is generic, so your insurance should cover it. If not, it shouldn’t be too crazy.

Pregabalin is another story. Lyrica is still under patent. That means it is pricey. I have pretty good insurance and most of my medications are actually free because I hit my annual out-of-pocket-maximum already. That does not mean I get to go around the insurance policy limits though.

My insurance plan only covers 300 mg per day of pregabalin. My doc tried to get them to allow me to have 400 mg per day because that is what works form. This is successful more often than you might think, but in this case, apparently that is not what is says on the medication’s “label” and it also is not in some book, or prescribing manual, so they will only pay for 300 mg per day.

Unfortunately, that leaves me short 30, 100mg pills per month. At my usual CVS pharmacy that costs an extra $111. I’m not looking to get into another $1200 per year of medical expenses.

I have a plan to try and get around it. We’ll have to see how it works out.

GoodRx Myeloma and Cancer

I have seen ads for GoodRx and my research makes it seem as though GoodRx is legit. According to the website, I could get the extra pregabalin I need at another pharmacy with a GoodRx coupon for a very reasonable cost. So, theoretically, all I need a prescription with no insurance information and the GoodRx app coupon, and I could get it for like $20.

I am having my doc’s office crank out the extra prescription and I will keep you posted about how it works out.

Categories
Multiple Myeloma Treatment

Myeloma Chemotherapy

red blood cells chemo

Chemotherapy generally starts out pretty well for a lot of myeloma patients, depending on where they were in the course of the disease when they got diagnosed. For weeks, friends and family remarked on how well I looked. It seemed like nothing had changed.

It turns out that the various myeloma chemotherapy drugs all have huge possible side effects. That isn’t surprising considering chemotherapy is essentially a big word for targeted poisoning. Its’s just that they can take a while to build up. You see, if you lose 20,000 healthy stem cells, your body has more. But, if you lose another 20,000 the next month… and the next… well you get the idea.

healthy cells chemo
Hello, little cells… the chemo drugs are here… AGGGHHHH!!!

All chemo drugs are poisons. They kill both healthy cells and cancer cells. In general, they target fast dividing cells. Cancer cells divide very quickly, but so do a lot of important cells in your body. The hope is that the drugs kill cancer cells faster than healthy cells, thereby giving a net win to the body overall.

Chemotherapy For Myeloma

For multiple myeloma, the front line of chemo usually consists of dexamethasone, velcade, and revalimid. There are many variations depending upon the patients circumstances and things like allergies and other reactions, but my oncologist calls this combination the peanut butter and jelly of myeloma treatment.

Dexamethasone and Myeloma

Dexamethasone is a cheap steroid that has been around for years. It is usually administered in small doses. The biggest size pill is 4 mg. For multiple myeloma patients, the dose is 20 mg. That’s five of the highest dose they make. If people actually took this dose, they’d make a larger pill. I take it on a sort of bizarre schedule of on two days, off one day, on two days, off the weekend. Either way, that’s a crap ton of dexamethasone.

Wondering about Credit Karma?

When you take a lot of steroids, it gives you energy and power. It also keeps you awake. I take the first dose and spend the night with very little sleep and very little tiredness. I am invincible!

But, when the steroids leave your body, it causes a terrible energy crash. Think chugging Red Bull and eating sugar all night and then the crash that comes after and multiply it by 10. This is where they start giving you medicines to fix the problems caused by the medicines they gave you before. Many patients get some form of sleeping pill that helps, but cannot overpower the second day of taking dexamethasone in a row.

Velcade and Myeloma

Next up is velcade. I’m not sure what dose of velcade I get. It is an injectiom that I go into the clinic for. They draw my blood. Then, we wait until the results show up saying that it is okay to give me the velcade without triggering a major medical event, or outright killing me.

I got a really nice talk from the “financial counselor” at the clinic about the bills I would be getting. Fortunately, I’m lucky enough to have good insurance. As near as I can tell, it is $4,000 per shot… I go in twice a week. I hit my out of pocket maximum the first week. It just takes a while for all the computers to update.

Velcade causes neuropathy. My fingers hurt. The tips are less sensitive. It’s not that I can’t feel them, it’s that they seem a tiny bit numb, like if they were minorly burned. I can touch stuff and type, but I have trouble being able to tell if there is one piece of paper or two. I can’t really feel the distinction. If there are two pages, I have trouble putting my fingers in the right place to separate them.

You should be starting to get an idea about how these drugs are not subtle.

Revlimid for Myeloma

Finally, revlimid is a relative of the drug thalidomide. Yes, that thalidomide. For those of you too young to be in on the “joke” thalidomide was a drug given to pregnant women in the 1960s to help with morning sickness, insomnia, and other stuff. The punch line? It can cause major birth defects.

So, what am I doing taking a version of this drug in 2019? Killing cancer cells.

I take the 25 mg tablets. I guess after my stem cell transplant I will take 10 mg tablets as part of maintenance mode, so I guess 25 mg is a lot. I take it on weekdays for three weeks, then I take a week off. I’m not 100% what this does. Maybe the idea is that if I stop poisoning myself for a week some of the healthy cells will come back before I die.

In order to get revlimid I have to answer a series of questions both with a pharmacist, and with a representative of the company that makes it. All of which are recorded. Essentially, I have to say that I’m using birth control (if sexually active with a woman with a “functioning uterus”). That I won’t share my medication, and that other people shouldn’t touch it. In other words, if a baby shows up with birth defects around me, and I try to sue, they have dozens of recordings of me saying it’s my own fault because I knew better.

As a man, I get off easy. Women have to take a pregnancy test each month.

Oh, and by the way, it costs $10,000+ for each month’s supply.

Myeloma Chemo vs Other Cancers

It turns out that I don’t know very much about cancer in general. Taking pills and shots while walking around doesn’t seem like the chemotherapy I see in movies and on TV shows. I guess I get the more typical chemotherapy experience in a few months when I do the stem cell transplant and they kill my immune system (stronger poison for better health!) and I spend a few weeks in the hospital.

I could be worse. I could have pancreatic cancer. As far as I can tell that’s the worst one. I’ll do more research when me and my dexamethasone can’t sleep.

Categories
Multiple Myeloma

Brian Has Multiple Myeloma

Cancer.

It’s as scary as a word gets. For millions of Americans it’s one of those things that happens to other people. There is maybe a friend or a family member, maybe a friend of friend with cancer, or maybe just someone you heard about that one time at your company or on Facebook.

Until 2019, I was one of them.

Multiple Myeloma

Not a lot of people have heard of multiple myeloma. That’s not surprising. It is considered a “rare” cancer. In 2018, approximately 125,000 people were living with myeloma in the United States. That might sound like a lot, but consider that there are 327 million people living in the U.S. and that percentage looks pretty small.

Or, if you want to compare multiple myeloma to more common cancers, consider that 268,000 new cases of breast cancers will be diagnosed this year alone. That’s more than the total ongoing cases of myeloma. Multiple myeloma’s closest, more famous, cousin is Leukemia, with 200,00 new cases diagnosed in the United States each year.

Getting Rare Cancer

Not only is multiple myeloma a rare cancer, it is most frequently diagnosed in people aged 65-74 years old. So, imagine how “lucky” you have to get to be diagnosed with multiple myeloma at age 45.

Yeah. I’d have rather gone to Vegas, thanks.

Why Another Website

So, what is the point of this whole thing?

Well, I’m a writer. I always have been. It’s my way of talking and actually getting to say what I mean to say. Also, I build websites. What’s one more?

Most importantly, writing can be therapeutic. I find that such writing is more therapeutic when I put it “out there.” Whether anyone ever finds it and reads it, or not is irrelevant. The fact that I publish what I think, write, and feel, is similar to actually talking to someone for me.

Finally, when I was first diagnosed with multiple myeloma I went searching for resources and had trouble coming up with what I was looking for. While there are many great resources out there with facts and figures for multiple myeloma, those resources are often very clinical. The American Cancer Society has a multiple myeloma section that is full of solid, factual information. The International Multiple Myeloma Foundation is another good resource.

And, if you see one of these in the literature holders at your oncologist’s office, or at the hospital, I highly recommend picking one up. It’s called the Multiple Myeloma guidelines for patients.

Multiple Myeloma Resource Guide
Multiple Myeloma Resource Guide – Guidelines for Patients

It’s nice to be able to thumb through a book when you’re brain is filled with a fog of worry and fear. (The same thing is available online at NCCN.org/patients.) You’ll have to click on that “more cancers” button in order to find the multiple myeloma one though. Might as well start getting used to it, this is an”other” cancer.

However, when you write advice like that for a broad audience you have to careful to not be too specific lest you write something that does not apply to everyone. One of the most frustrating things about multiple myeloma is constantly being told that everyone is different, so no one will really give you any answers.

multiple myeloma resource guide

It is true of course. Everyone is different. Not only that, there are a ton of different kinds of multiple myeloma characterized by which genes are mutated and what kind of light chains you have, and so on. And, that’s all before you account for the fact that it will affect younger people differently than older people. That some people tolerate treatment very well, while others don’t tolerate it at all. Still others respond well to some things while others don’t.

The purpose of this website then will be to provide MY experience and MY discoveries that I make about MY multiple myeloma along the way. Such specific, real world, understand of what it is like to actually have multiple myeloma is incredibly useful, even if not everything applies to your specific case. As such, I hope to provide a myeloma resource that I wish I would have found back when I was first diagnosed, and frankly, ever since.

It will take a while. I’ve been “meaning” to start writing this site for almost six months now, but one of the things that MM does is rob you of time. Between doctor appointments, fatigue, medication side effects, and mental stress getting to things like extra projects can be tough. The good news is that I’ve got ideas, and now I’ve got it started. That means it will come easier and faster now.