{"id":1,"date":"2019-09-07T10:17:25","date_gmt":"2019-09-07T10:17:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/findingbeautyduringbreastcancer.com\/\/?p=1"},"modified":"2019-09-11T23:17:03","modified_gmt":"2019-09-12T04:17:03","slug":"cold-caps","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/findingbeautyduringbreastcancer.com\/index.php\/2019\/09\/07\/cold-caps\/","title":{"rendered":"Cold Caps (Scalp Cooling Systems)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I do not want to encourage or\ndiscourage anyone from using a scalp cooling system but merely share my\nexperience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Background<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before I was diagnosed with breast\ncancer, I had never heard of using scalp cooling systems to prevent hair loss\nduring chemotherapy.  I just assumed that\nif I went through chemotherapy, I would lose all of my hair.  Shortly after receiving my diagnosis, I met\nwith a nurse navigator from the hospital that performed my biopsy.  She mentioned that special cold caps could be\nworn during treatment to prevent hair loss. \nCold caps work by narrowing the blood vessels below the scalp, reducing\nthe amount of chemotherapy medicine that reaches the hair follicles\n(breastcancer.org\/tips\/hair_skin_nails\/cold-caps).  I was very interested in trying a scalp\ncooling system, but I did not have much information on how effective it would\nbe.  I was later referred to a team of\ndoctors at MD Anderson.  My treatment\nplan included 12 weekly rounds of Paclitaxel (Taxol) followed by 4 rounds of\nAdriamycin\/Cytoxan (AC) every three weeks (later shorted to every two\nweeks).  My oncologist at MD Anderson did\nnot bring up the option of using cold caps. \nI asked her if it would be an option for my treatment plan.  She said that MD Anderson would provide a\nscalp cooling system (typically not covered by insurance) for patients only\nreceiving Taxol, but because of the lack of studies showing the effectiveness\nfor AC chemo, MD Anderson would not provide a scalp cooling system for my\ntreatment.  But, if I wanted to bring in\ncold caps from an external provider, I was welcome to use them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Use<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

After much deliberation, I decided to give cold caps a try.  I selected a provider that supplied 6 cold caps, a cooler for storage of the cold caps during treatment, an infrared thermometer, and a heated blanket.  The cost of the cold caps was a $375 per month rental fee.  When I finished treatment, I returned the cold caps and was allowed to keep the cooler and all other supplies.  To cool the caps to the required temperature, they must be placed in the cooler with dry ice overnight.  So, the day before each treatment, I drove 20 miles to a local dry ice supplier (http:\/\/iceexpress.com<\/a>) and purchased 80 to 85 pounds of dry ice.  The cost of the dry ice was between $80 and $95 per treatment.  Some dry ice suppliers provide delivery of the dry ice for an additional fee.  Many large grocery stores also sell dry ice, but at a much higher cost than the dry ice supplier.  After four months of treatment, I spent $2,100 on rental of the cold caps and $1,400 on dry ice ($3,500 total).  The day of treatment, I put on a cold cap 1 hour before treatment.  I put it on as soon as I got in a treatment room.  The nurses at MD Anderson were very accommodating.  They would start my pre-meds and ask what time I wanted to start the chemo, knowing that I needed to have the cap on an hour before treatment began.  Every 30 minutes my husband would take a cap out of the cooler and help me change it.  After the chemo treatment completed, I would continue to change the caps every 30 minutes for 3 hours for Taxol treatments and 5 hours for AC treatments.  To be honest, wearing cold caps was the most difficult part of chemo days.  If I had not had to change my caps every 30 minutes, I probably would have slept through most of my treatments.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Results<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Individual results with cold cap\nuse will vary greatly, but I want to share my results as a point of\nreference.  I had very good results\nduring my Taxol treatments.  I had\nconsiderable shedding, but at the end of my 12 treatments, my hair loss was not\nnoticeable.  The pictures below show the\nchanges in my hair at different points of my treatment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Before Chemo<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
7 Weeks Into Taxol<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
After 12th<\/sup> and Last Taxol Treatment<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

I started AC chemo the week after\ncompleting Taxol.  A couple of weeks in,\nI noticed more considerable shedding. \nBut, I was still able to go out with my natural hair and not feel self-conscience\nthroughout my treatments.  Below is a\npicture from my last day of chemo.  My\nhair was thinner, but the loss was not significant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Last Day of AC Chemo<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

I had hoped that the shedding would\nstop within a few weeks of my last treatment. \nUnfortunately, that was not the case. \nMy hair continued to shed and shed and shed and shed.  After all the effort I put into the cold\ncaps, I was very discouraged.  The\nhardest part was not knowing when the shedding would end.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
7 Weeks Post Chemo<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Fortunately, while the old hair\ncontinued to shed, new hair began to grow. \nThree months post chemo, I had a couple of inches of new hair growth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
3 Months Post Chemo<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The picture above shows my hair at\nits thinnest.  In the end, I estimate\nthat I lost 90% of my hair.  The good\nnews is that I never had any bald spots. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I had a really hard time letting go\nof my long hair.  My hair had been long\nsince I was 10 years old.  I considered\ngetting semi-permanent hair extensions, but after a consultation, I decided\nthat the cost and maintenance time was just too much for me.  So, three and a half months post chemo, I had\nall my old hair cut off. 
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
3.5 Months Post Chemo<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

At first I hated it.  I cried as soon as I left the salon (and shed\na few tears while at the salon).  But\nafter a few days of getting used to it, I did not mind it so much.  I actually received a lot of complements on\nmy hair.  At first I thought people were\njust trying to be nice, but occasionally I would get complements from\nstrangers.  After cutting my hair, it\nbegan to grow very quickly.  And the\nshedding finally stopped.  The pictures\nbelow show the hair growth over the following months.
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
5 Months Post Chemo<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
6 Months Post Chemo<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
7 Months Post Chemo<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
8 Months Post Chemo<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
9 Months Post Chemo (Straight vs Curly)<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Final\nThoughts<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Using cold caps was difficult and\nexpensive.  If someone is to only have\nTaxol treatments, I would definitely recommend trying cold caps if keeping her\nhair is important to her and she has the financial means.  With AC chemo, the decision whether or not to\nuse cold caps is more difficult.  If I\ncould go back and make the decision again knowing the results I would have, I\nbelieve I would still choose to use cold caps, for the following reasons:  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

  1. I never had any bald spots.  That was important to me so that I did not appear sick to my two young children (4 and 8 at the time).  After I cut my hair, my 8 year-old son said that he had not noticed that I had lost most of my hair.<\/li>
  2. I was able to wear my hair naturally throughout treatments.<\/li>
  3. There were only around three months during which I did not feel comfortable wearing my hair naturally.  Most of that time I was able to wear hair extensions and\/or a hat.  I only occasionally wore a wig.  I did not like wearing a wig because I found it to be uncomfortable and difficult to brush out tangles.<\/li>
  4. Once the shedding stopped, I was able to wear a short hairstyle that I was happy with.<\/li>
  5. My hair grew back quickly.  Within 9 months after the end of chemo, I had around 6 inches of hair growth in some places.<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    Cold caps are not for everyone, but\nI was glad that I had an option to keep my hair during chemotherapy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    I do not want to encourage or discourage anyone from using a scalp cooling system but merely share my experience. Background Before I was diagnosed with breast cancer, I had never heard of using scalp cooling systems to prevent hair loss during chemotherapy.  I just assumed that if I went through chemotherapy, I would lose all of my hair.  Shortly … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":120,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hair"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbgyjH-1","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/findingbeautyduringbreastcancer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Vintage-Florals5.jpg?fit=3000%2C2400&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/findingbeautyduringbreastcancer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/findingbeautyduringbreastcancer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/findingbeautyduringbreastcancer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/findingbeautyduringbreastcancer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/findingbeautyduringbreastcancer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/findingbeautyduringbreastcancer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44,"href":"https:\/\/findingbeautyduringbreastcancer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1\/revisions\/44"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/findingbeautyduringbreastcancer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/120"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/findingbeautyduringbreastcancer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/findingbeautyduringbreastcancer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/findingbeautyduringbreastcancer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}