Stage IV Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer: Donna's Patient Story
This lung cancer diagnosis at a glance
- Stage at diagnosis
- Stage IV
- Subtype
- Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer
- Sex
- Female
- Treatment
- chemotherapy, immunotherapy and a clinical trial
- Outcome
- Stable Disease
Treatment course, step by step
- Donna began chemotherapy, with severe sickness during the first week of each cycle.
- She later switched to an unnamed maintenance therapy, but stopped after about 8 weeks because it continued to make her sick.
- When the tumors began growing again, she entered a Phase III trial of nivolumab and continued immunotherapy with stable tumors.
What happened, in summary
Donna Fernandez was 59 and active with her dogs when unexplained weight gain led her to a primary care visit. Her doctor felt a knot near her collarbone and arranged imaging. A PET scan and biopsy ultimately showed Stage IV nonsquamous non-small cell lung cancer. The diagnosis was especially difficult because Donna’s father had died of lung cancer at age 49.
Donna quickly started chemotherapy. The first week of each cycle made her extremely sick, followed by gradual recovery before the next cycle. When her body could no longer tolerate the regimen, she moved to an unnamed maintenance therapy. After about 8 weeks, she stopped that treatment because she was still very ill, and the tumors began growing again.
Faced with another chemotherapy option or a clinical trial, Donna chose the trial. She enrolled in a Phase III study of nivolumab. Compared with chemotherapy, the immunotherapy was much easier for her to tolerate, although her thyroid stopped working and required daily medication. The tumors did not disappear, but they stopped growing. Donna continued treatment while running agility with her dogs several days a week and living much as she had before her diagnosis.
Where this story comes from
This is a lay summary of an account first published by AACR. Read the original in full
These are lay summaries of published cancer stories, for information only. No two cancers behave the same way, and nothing here predicts your own diagnosis or replaces advice from your oncology team.