My husband has had 6 weeks of Erbitux and has 4 to go. He also had 2 doses of Cisplatin, 4 weeks apart. It's been hard to know what effects came from which drug. But we know that the acne/rash came from the Erbitux. His rash peaked at about 3 weeks. Then the MO put him on an antibiotic and that helped the rash a lot. He's off the antibiotic now and the rash has subsided by 80%. Frankly, we're a little concerned about it because early on, the doc wanted to see the rash because he said it showed the drug was working. Well, now, without the rash, is it still working? We are using Erbitux post-surgery, so have nothing to monitor (compared to Amy's John's tumor that has shrunk since starting Erbitux--Amy, is it still?).

As far as we can isolate Erbitux effects, there seem to be few others. Tom gets two liters of fluid, Tylenol and Benedryl with his weekly Erbitux.

The most troublesome side effect we're dealing with now is dry, cracking skin on Tom's fingers and feet. I know I read this would be a side effect from either the Cisplatin or the Erbitux, but can't remember which (and it's not listed on the info sheets from the hospital). Is anyone else dealing with this?

Amy, thanks for starting this thread. I was going to post the question about cracked skin anyway.

Joyce

CG to Tom dx SCC 5/06; right neck lymph nodes removed, dx right tonsil and tonsillectomy 6/06; rad and chemo started 7/06; treatment COMPLETED 9/06 33x rad; Erbitux (8x); Cisplatin (2);