meds. and what to do about nausea

[Guest guest]

Well, I'm here because of my brother-in-law, but in my other life, I

have been unlucky enough to get to try anti-nausea drugs for chemo!

Now...I don't know how they'd affect a damaged pancreas, but two of the

newest drugs are zofran and kytril. Think there is a third drug also

in the same class.

Mainly, I got compazine (a much older drug and thus cheap; in the same

class as thorazine). Made me feel weird.

Anyway it sure didn't work with the one major bout of nausea and

vomiting I had (after abdominal chemo). I was swtiched to the newer

meds., along with iv fluids.

Finally, on day 8 I managed to eat a very small bag of potato chips,

when I was momentarily freed of the iv and traveled down some floors to

the candy stripers cart and peeked outdoors (just a hospital driveway,

but still the change of pace/place may have helped). But, clearly, the

meds. were not an instant 'cure'.

BTW, my husband was abit grossed out that I broke the bag open immediately

before we got a chance to pay, whereas I was so pleased to even want to

try a taste, so of course, I didn't care about such nice-ities.

Zofran was and probably still is alot more expensive than compazine and

Kytril sky high. Be sure to ask about cost and coverage, but also

insist on the best. I read an article recently that suggested

Zofran & Kytril are being used as first choices for chemo for

breakthrough nausea.

But as I said, I don't know what would be recommended for pancreatitis

patients. Is their nausea is different in kind from what cancer patients

go through? I don't know.

The meds. probably work better preventing nausea than interrupting

it once started.

But here's another suggestion... try eating in a new place/situation,

one not associated with nausea. Because there is a learned component

to nausea and taste aversions and this can happen automatically

with a single experience. A particular taste or smell is especially

likely to become a trigger, esp. if novel/unfamilar, but so can visual

cues.

The importance of this kind of learning was not recognized until

the 1970s (the original labatory studies are classics now... or

so I tried to tell my undergraduate students, a healthy lot...

Other than meds. well, I'm sure you know about ginger (helps some

I think) and cannabis. Anyway, a few days before my turn around (when I

ate the chips) I was able to eat lemon-flavored ice and enjoy it. In

contrast, I'd sip at the ginger ale all day and never finish the can. Of

course, the stuff was flat and warm after the first hour. And come to

think of it Canada Dry is kinda bland, not very gingery, now is.

Lord knows what's in it, beside sugar and coloring, probably not real

ginger.

--

Sally

Sally L. Hobson, Ph. D.

mailto:hobson@...

http://www.adelphi.edu/~hobson