You open the report, spot a string of letters and numbers, and your stomach drops. If you are living with cancer, in treatment, or in remission, a PET scan SUV can look like a verdict. This number, officially known as the Standardized Uptake Value, is just one data point found within your PET/CT imaging results….
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Understanding Pseudoprogression During Immunotherapy
A scan can knock the breath out of you. You start treatment, hold onto hope, then hear that a tumor looks bigger. How could that possibly be good news? When you experience pseudoprogression during immunotherapy, the first picture can look worse even when the treatment is beginning to succeed. This phenomenon is most frequently observed…
Read moreSteroid Side Effects During Cancer Care: Mood, Sleep, and Blood Sugar
Steroids are common during cancer treatment, and they often help fast. You might get dexamethasone, prednisone, or methylprednisolone to prevent nausea, reduce swelling, boost appetite, or calm inflammation. For some people, they also make radiation or chemo easier to tolerate. The tricky part is that steroid side effects can show up quickly, sometimes within days….
Read moreChemo Hair Loss Scalp Care That Reduces Itch and Tenderness
During chemotherapy hair loss, hair can fall out in clumps, slowly thin, or come out all at once. Yet the part people don’t always expect is the scalp itself, the sting, the itch, the “sunburn” feeling that shows up when you least need another hard thing. If you’re in cancer treatment (or coming out the…
Read morePericardial Effusion in Cancer: Cardiac Tamponade Signs and When to Call 911
When you’re living with pericardial effusion during cancer, your body can feel like a room with a smoke alarm that keeps chirping. Not every beep means a fire, but you still need to know what “danger” sounds like. Fluid around the heart can build slowly, or it can change fast. The hard part is that…
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