Hi Jo;
I've been reading your blog and am in awe! You are a true inspiration!
I am currently raising awareness of a national petition for scalp cooling to be the standard treatment for all cancer patients. Was scalp cooling mentioned to you?
Have a look at our website and see if it's something you would be interested in helping us raise awareness for :)
If you would like to sign the petition then please do via the link above.
I was lucky enough to be offered the Cold Cap (Beautiful(!) picture here) but unfortunately for me it didn't work. I hadn't realised that Cold Capping was not standard practice and just assumed that it was offered to everyone.
Cold Capping machines are very expensive and I was lucky enough that Comet Ward had a fantastic fundraiser who raised enough money to buy a machine.
Some oncologists are also not convinced by (and therefore don't offer as standard) Cold Caps as they believe they increase the risk of scalp mets. Basically Cold Caps stop the drugs working by reducing the temperature so mucho that they don't work in that area. Therefore attempting to save the hair follicles. Therefore if there are secondaries in the scalp, they would not be treated by the chemo.
I can understand that some people would prefer NHS money spent on other things but I do think that people should be given the choice whether or not they would like to use the cap.
It's a difficult debate but I think in the end, it all comes down to freedom of choice.
No comments:
Post a Comment