onkommon.com
Systemic therapy
Blood support & growth factors
Keeping counts safe enough for treatment to continue on schedule.
What it is
Treatment that works on dividing cells also suppresses the marrow. Transfusion replaces what has fallen; growth factors push the marrow to recover faster so the next cycle is not delayed.
Delay and dose reduction are the quiet ways a curative course becomes a partial one. Managing counts properly is how a schedule is kept.
When it is used
- Where counts fall enough to delay treatment or risk infection
- Prophylactically, with regimens known to cause severe neutropenia
- Where symptomatic anaemia is limiting function
- Around surgery or a procedure
How the decision is made
- Whether prophylactic growth-factor support is indicated for the regimen, decided at the start rather than after the first admission.
- Transfusion thresholds, set for the patient rather than by habit.
- Iron, B12 and folate status, because not every anaemia in cancer is from treatment.
Transfusion at a partner facility. Growth-factor injections at a day-care unit or, where appropriate, at home after training.
Who does what
What we handle, and what happens elsewhere
KPCIRC handles
- Prophylaxis decision at the start of the regimen
- Written thresholds for transfusion and for growth-factor use
- Anaemia workup, not everything is treatment-related
- Infection and neutropenia protocol
- Coordination so the next cycle is not lost
Performed and billed elsewhere
- Blood products and cross-matching
- Transfusion administration
- The growth-factor medicine
- A fever while your counts are low is an emergency regardless of how well you otherwise feel. Do not wait for morning.
Questions to ask your own doctor
Take these with you. They work whether or not you are treated here.
- Does my regimen need preventive growth-factor support?
- What count would make you delay treatment?
- Is my anaemia from the treatment, or is something else going on?
- What do I do about a fever at night?
Support that goes with it
Where this is used
Cancers this commonly forms part of
Leukaemia
Acute and chronic leukaemias. ALL, AML, CLL, CML
Lymphoma
Hodgkin and non-Hodgkin lymphoma
Myeloma
Multiple myeloma
Breast cancer
Including hormone-receptor positive, HER2-positive and triple-negative disease
Lung & thoracic cancer
Non-small cell and small cell lung cancer, mesothelioma, thymic tumours
Colorectal cancer
Colon and rectal cancer, bowel cancer
Not sure this is the right option for you?
That is exactly what a second opinion is for. Bring what you have, we will tell you what is missing and what the alternatives actually are, in writing.