Greetings everyone. My father is getting treated for Oral cancer of the soft palate. He diagnosed of cancer in August 2009. At that time the stage was T3N0M0. Oncologist prescribed chemotherapy. The chemotherapist put him up on TIP (Taxol, Ifosamide, Cisplatin) 3 cycles in 3 months. At the end of chemo, the oncologist prescribed IMRT 30 doses (I don't know the strength) with concurrent target therapy.
Here is the problem. He has developed some white patches and according to him they look like what they used to when he had been diagnosed with cancer. The oncologist is saying that it can be fungus infection (candidiasis is what i discovered from google) or the disease itself and he cannot tell at this moment. he has prescribed some drugs to counter act the infection. We are keeping out fingers crossed. Any one else develop this kind of white patches after radio?

P.s: Radio ended on 20th Jan and there were no white patches then. they started coming before a week ago. He is also suffering from xerostomia.

Sounds like oral thrush to me. I battled it for almost 3 months off and on post rad tx. I would use the oral nystatin but since it would never completely go away, they added diflucan pills as well...that did the trick, no problems since.

sounds right elizabeth. andy has the same thing. takes diflucan as well.
vaibhav-congrats to ur father for getting thru treatment. besides the thrush, hope recovery is going well.

thank you all but is there any way to distinguish oral thrush from the cancer coming back again, is there any visual difference, pain, itching or anything that distinguish oral thrush from the cancer coming back?

Read the page on Candida on the main OCF web site, it will answer all these questions. But the simple question is Candida is a white patch that you can actually scrape off with your fingernail. It will be red underneath and still sore (sometimes). It clears up quickly with the proper meds. Dyflucan in particular will wipe it out in a week. Treatments trash you immune system for awhile, and candida blooms when this happens and things get out of balance.

thanks brian. I just talked to my father about the candida infection. i was really afraid to talk to him about trying to scrape that off and see whether it comes off. I really dont want him to get upset if it does not come off. He was already telling that if its a second bout of cancer he isnt going to take treatment.
I really dont know what to do!! He was telling that the oncologist was poking at the white patches and then he commented that it can be a fungal infection or it can be the cancer returning. I dont have the courage to ask if anything did get on the instrument with which he was examing the white patch.

I too have white patches. They are on the roof of my mouth and I can scrape them off, but they do not hurt. The Nystatin did not work to get rid of it.

angelia -you likely still have a Candida infection. Ask the doc to put you on Diflucan for a week. It is much stronger ( and systemic) than a rinse. You need to get rid of it.

As to being too afraid to try to scrape it off with your fingernail or ask, I don't know what to tell you.... Do you want to know or not? If it does not come off this still doesn't mean that it is cancer, it can just be a leukoplakia. But I don't understand this issue of not wanting to know. If it is something bad, and it probably isn't, the sooner you know the sooner you can do something about it with better end results.

Sounds like Thrush to me. I had a bad recurring bout post radiation that the rinses would put in remission but the second I stopped rinsing it would come back. Rad Onc finally put me on some pills for about 3 weeks and that got rid of it.

Thrush is just the layman's term for Candida, they are the same thing. The pills you were put on were an anti-fungal the most popular of which I have already mentioned. Diflucan.

Can diflucan be crushed and put down tube? I still can not swallow anything but water.

I have crushed Diflucan, mixed it into some water and using my syringe put it down my PEG with zero problems.

I have thrush from time to time and after radiation the back of my throat is white is some spots and pink in others and many visible capalaries close to the surface. ENT says all very typical of post radiation look. Dentist who is a cancer specialist says same thing. All normal looks.

yes. I used to use a pill crusher and feed it through the PEG tube. I was allergic to Diflucan unfornuately.

I have a (permanent) white patch on the right side of my tongue. Same side of my tongue that had the tumor & received the most radiation. Seen by all 3 of my team dr. My radiation dr. took a swab, it came back -clear. So now she calls it an "ulcer". It only bothers me if I have had to much of acid type foods. When it hurts me, I apply a perscription my dr. made for me: Lidocaine 2% Visc Solution. It is soothing. I use as needed during the day & at bedtime. I check my tongue patch weekly, it does not seem to get any bigger or smaller. Just another war wound!