You may want to post this question on the Member's Forum for more feedback from other ovca patients.
I know some of the ladies have had success with avastin.
Good luck,
Judy C.
Hi There,
avastin is very easy to take. It is given IV. The usual schedule is every 2 to 3 weeks. It is a quick infusion. Commonly, we have given it in combination with another chemotherapeutic agent such as taxol or cytoxan. I have pasted the significant medical dangers of avastin. These occur 1to 10 % of the time depending on the individual person's risk factors. For women with ovarian cancer, a bowel obstruction or multiple prior bowel surgeries may increase the risk of bowel perforation or fistula.
take care
Important Safety Information
Gastrointestinal (GI) perforation: Treatment with Avastin can result in the development of a potentially serious side effect called GI perforation. In clinical trials, these events occurred throughout the course of treatment and in some cases resulted in fatality. Avastin therapy should be permanently stopped in people with GI perforation.
Wound healing complication: Treatment with Avastin can lead to slow or incomplete wound healing (for example, when a surgical incision has trouble healing or staying closed). In some cases, this event resulted in fatality. Avastin therapy should be permanently stopped in patients with wound healing complications that require medical treatment. The appropriate waiting time between stopping treatment with Avastin and having surgery has not been determined.
Hemorrhage: Some people receiving Avastin with chemotherapy for lung cancer experienced hemoptysis (a severe bleeding problem at the site of the tumor). In some cases, this event resulted in fatality. People with recent hemoptysis should not receive Avastin.
In clinical trials, additional serious side effects in patients receiving Avastin with chemotherapy included non-GI fistula formation, strokes or heart problems (blood clots), hypertensive crisis (severe hypertension), reversible posterior leukoencephalopathy syndrome (nervous system and vision disturbances), neutropenia (a reduced white blood cell count that may increase the chance of infection), nephrotic syndrome (a sign of severe kidney malfunction), and congestive heart failure. The most common adverse events seen in patients receiving Avastin with chemotherapy across all studies were weakness, pain, abdominal pain, headache, hypertension, diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, loss of appetite, mouth sores, constipation, upper respiratory infection, nosebleeds, difficulty breathing, skin irritation, and proteinuria (a possible sign of kidney malfunction).