Mehtdad357,

I’m sorry to hear of your troubles! It sort of reminded me of my case, when I had 7 recurrences. I was given minimal treatment options after my first chemo, and changed my team three times at different hospitals. My last dr and hospital did treatment I never dreamed of, and then Proton Radiation and Chemo, after surgery and IORT, an internal radiation, cured me!

Initially, from my first week of high dose chemo in 2009, I was down for the count, and hospitalized for 6 months with no further treatment options, so I believe it was the start of my 6 recurrences, which was persistent. It took me 10 years to be considered cancer free this past winter, after 5 years of no recurrences.

If I didn’t change teams, I don’t know what would have happened. As Christine mentioned, you have to seek other options. Travel is not a problem, and it may not be costly. Once I stayed at Hope Lodge in Manhattan for free, except food. Hope Lodge is even better than many top hotels! You can come to NYC if you want, among other places, but we have the most top hospitals, maybe Boston too, in one area. Maybe you can get 2nd, 3rd or 4th optinions in one or two days.

Proton Therapy may even be an option, and about five top NYC hospitals utilize the Proton Center in NJ, while the one in NYC is built.

There are other type of radiation too like IORT, Brachytherapy, Cyber knife and others, which may be options. Chemo itself doesn’t kill this cancer by itself. If it does, it usually doesn’t last more than a year, I know.

I had Erbitux and Taxotere, one time, with Radiation, which didn’t work. I thought Erbitux wasn’t recommended for HPV related cancer by itself anymore, and is less effective, so I thought I read and heard. Usually it’s Cisplaton, unless there is a reason not to have it, but there are others to replace it like Carboplaton.

They combine chemos, have Immono therapy and Chemo, and I believe multiple types of immunotherapy treatments.

All hospitals are not the same sometimes. In my case, they will not refer you to another hospital, dr, that has a different treatment than theirs or recommend such. You have to do it yourself!

I didn’t plan on writing this much, but did. Good luck with everything!