Newly diagnosed with bone mets

I'm very sorry to hear of your new diagnosis, @mary625 . Fortunately, bone-only estrogen-positive metasasis is a relatively good place to be in Stage IV breast cancer world. I was diagnosed with de novo Stage IV breast cancer two years ago. At first, my team missed my bone metastases, so I did AC-T chemo first, then was prescribed Kisqali/letrozole and Zometa. I am very stable on these meds so far. I had a biopsy to a lesion on my iliac crest which was done with fentanyl. I was awake, but felt only pressure and recovered quickly. There is a lot of hope since breast cancer research is advancing by leaps and bounds. I wish you a long life.

Hi, @mary625 and all. I (age 66) have a very similar situation to yours, Mary, diagnosed at the end of January this year - BC recurrence from 2010, bone mets only. The absolute worst part for me was the two weeks between the "bone lesions consistent with metastatic disease" MRI report and not seeing my oncologist until over two weeks later after more scans, tests, and the biopsy she wanted before seeing me. NOBODY telling me I was going to be okay, there is treatment for this, etc. I had visions of mastectomies and chemo (again) running through my brain. So let me be the one to tell you YOU ARE GOING TO BE OKAY!!! I started two weeks of daily radiation immediately on the two painful areas on my spine and that took care of the pain within a few weeks (I had mostly spine and pelvis and ribs mets but did have a spot radiated one time on my femur). Laying on my back on that hard surface in radiology brought tears of pain to my eyes and the radiologist did tell me, "You are going to feel better!" And he was right. The markings for radiation are even easier than 15 years ago. My biopsy was in the hip/pelvis bone, laying on my side, awake but the anesthesia was terrific, no pain, and really no pain afterward, either. I have been on twice-daily Verzenio 100 mg, monthly Faslodex injections, and 3-month Zometa bone infusions since completing radiation. I have been coping and managing with the G.I. and diarrhea issues, to be honest, since starting the drug treatments on Feb. 21. So I am a little over six months in with the drug treatments, have been in physical therapy to rebuild strength and stamina (after a year of decline from pain we all thought was caused by worsening scoliosis from bone loss due to years of Tamoxifen and Arimidex) and I am doing my home exercises, progressing, getting stronger, walking 2 miles a day and building on that, keeping up with my normal activities again. I'm just hoping my G.I. issues are under better control and I can travel again soon, injections and infusions schedules permitting. You are going to be okay!!!

There's no more SCCA. It all got incorporated into Fred Hutch and UW.

Hi All,

I’m most likely to have bone mets to femur. My CA15-3 tumor markers & alk phos were elevated and been having on off pain on my left thigh. Just did my PET-CT (a few hot spots on the femur area) & MRI last Thursday, seeing oncologist Monday but she didn’t say anything about biopsy only radiation. My first bc diagnosis was on this month exactly 10 years ago so i really don’t know what to expect 😞

@faith71 My initial scans showed bone lesions mostly cervical-to-sacral spine, ribs, hip, and pelvis and I received two weeks of radiation for the painful areas (which helped). The radiologist saw one spot on the femur in those initial scans and treated it one time as a precaution (versus daily for two weeks like the other areas). Best of luck to you with radiation and I hope it helps with your pain.