the other question that has come up, totally separate from if I should continue Amifostine shots, is that my second chemo was delayed. It should have been Monday but I was feeling as though I had a unrinary tract infection coming on (just the very early symptoms but those are what you want to catch), ws running a low fever in the evenings, and had a very low WBC adn RBC count.

Then they said probably by Wednesday (today) I could have it since the blood showed Monday lots of WBC platelets just forming (these have a special name--can't recall what they're called) that should release to adult white blood cells in a couple of days. But they didn't. So that's out for today too. But they went back and did a "hand count" from the sample and decided that there were more WB cells there than the machne had said so I'm going to have chemo tommorrow.

This would be three days off schedule with rad, but they had a malfunction in their computer and so I missed a day there Monday as well, so it's two days off schedule.

Still that means the earliest I'd get my next (lasy) chemo, 3 weeks from tommorrow, would be my very last day of radiation. I guess that one still acts as a radiosensitizer for the cells for the weeks after rad is over when it "keeps on giving"? And what if I have the same problems then? At what point does the chmo get so out of synch that it might mean I only do two treatments overall?

Have others of you who had chemo and rad concurrently run into this?

I had some delays during treatment, twice because I was too ill and 3 times because the machine was down. They also shortened my Cisplatin treatments to 2 instead of 3. My WBC & RBC was pretty low as well because of both the radiation and the Cisplatin. 25 months later I finally have a normal WBC (although on the low end). The Cisplatin works for about 3 weeks at a time. The radiation still does the heavy lifting - the Cisplatin is an adjunct.

It still killed the cancer (practically killed me along with it but I am ok now ;-).

Nelie-
I had 4 Cisplatin treatments of which only 2 were during radiation. The last two were each postponed a week for one reason or another. Don't remember now why. I wouldn't worry about a short delay between treatments. - Kris

Nelie, I had 4 Cisplatin treatments spread on 4 consecutive weeks during radiation. That means I completed the chemo within the first month of my treatment. I didn't have any chemo or radiation delayed because before my treatment, I kept myself at the fittest stage by doing excercises and eating a lot of nutritious food.I knew that my health would be weakened drastically once treatment started and I didn't want to lengthen my treatment duration. So within 7 weeks, I had 48 rounds of radiation together with 4 chemo,as scheduled. No break in between except on Saturday and Sunday.

Karen.

Nelie, I missed a week, or rather one chemo was delayed a week because my blood counts were too low. Didn't seem to make any difference because I am still here and kicking and feeling great three years later. Don't let this be one of your worries.