? about Vidaza

[karenkay]

So, is this chemotherapy? The doctor at Loyola said this may be a treatment option for my dad. Can someone give me some info. on it? I have looked it up on the internet, but I don’t understand everything I read. Thank you. Karen

[eve]

karen

my dad has been on vidaza 1 1/2 years (that is really hard to believe, time just flies)

vidaza is classified as a chemotherapy drug, but compared to some of the others the side effects are relatively mild

for my dad it has not been a cure, but it has allowed him to spread the time in between txs

they recently lowered the dose he is taking – dad has not had a tx since the beginning of january

my dad is also dealing with myleofibrosis so he has a few things going on with his blood and in my opinion his condition would have probably gotten a lot worse a lot sooner had he not been on the vidaza

good luck to your dad – i hope they find the right treatment for him

eve

[Terri]

Bob has been On Vidaza also This is the second time, Last year he did six rounds and it reduced his blast, it lasted for 7 months. Then The blast were increasing so now he just finished his 5th round. Waiting to see if Doctor will do anohter bmb to see if blast are down and we can spread the vidaza treatments out more.
No tx since Dec 2003. He gets very tired from the Vidaza but as eve said side effects are minimal.

[doreen]

Does anyone know if Vidaza bring the blasts down to a Normal level or is Chemo the only thing that can do that.?

[eve]

vidaza is chemo

[Neil]

Hi Doreen,
There are no guarantees Vidaza or traditional chemo will reduce blasts in every patient.
So far stats indicate Vidaza will help 18% of those who have tried it. Seems those with RAEB have a better track record, but cant find any stats to verify it.
Decitibine is another drug that has about the same results.
Would follow the suggestions provided by a hemo on the best options.

[Suzanne]

I went to a presentation on MDS by Dr. Gore from Hopkins last Friday, sponsored by the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.. A good part of it was on new develpments in treatments. Most of the drugs people on the forum are taking were mentioned. It did seem to me like more and more is being documented about people with specific genetic markers or chromosome changes,risk categories, or types of disease reacting positively to specific meds. I suspect that this is happening as the pool of patients in the statisical group they are following gets larger and they can isolate some of the individual traits. The main thing new that I heard is that they are now taking meds that have helped 18-20% and combining them with other meds to see if they can increase the response rate. I actually thought,even tho the mortality rates are still there and the charts were still frightening, that there was a lot of basis for hope. I always learn something new at these presentations.

[Terri]

Doreen, Last year bob did 6 rounds, His blast got down to 5% which the doc feels is a normal range, We had 7 months of no treatments and Bob’s counts hung on and he felt really well, In October they were back up to 14% and he has started vidaza. Doctor feels the blast are down again and will do another bmb but he feels he will keep him on the Vidaza like a Mtc treatment so that He does not progress to AML. There really is no track record on this if keeping him on it as a mtc will keep the blast down to normal, We have a lot of faith in our Doctor he is aggressive and so caring.

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