Freek Rikkerink (32) started life -prolonging medication just after the discovery of metastatic lung cancer in his body. “Fortunately no chemo,” he said. Why not?
The news that Freek Rikkerink from Suzan & Freek is incurably ill because of metastatic lung cancer has taken a bomb. Suddenly the singer surprised this week with a bright spot: he started life -prolonging medication. “To brake the cancer as much as possible,” said the singer himself on his Instagram. “Fortunately no chemo.”
Classic chemo
Why doesn’t Freek get chemotherapy but life -prolonging pills? “With the right patient we can often achieve more with such medication than with classic chemo or immunotherapy,” explains Dieter Stevens, pulmonary oncologist at UZ Gent, in the Newspaper.
The reason for that? “The disease can then be kept under better control, and people usually feel better during treatment.”
‘Only diarrhea’
Freek can simply take the life -prolonging medication at home, says Dieter. You don’t have to come to the hospital every three weeks. However, the biggest disadvantage of Chemo is the many side effects.
This is different in Freek’s medication, the pulmonologist continues. “Skin rash or diarrhea can occur, but we still see that the majority of people tolerate the medication well. It rarely happens that we have to stop treatment or drastically lower the dose.”
Hopeful
If the lung cancer has already spread so far, Chemo is too heavy a load, says Dieter. “With metastases, when healing is no longer possible, we want to mainly control and stabilize the disease. Life extension is a hopeful prospect, but above all an improved quality of life is central.”
Freeks lung cancer was probably created by a mistake in a gene. “If we then determine the disease in young people who do not smoke, then we consciously look for such a mutation that we can treat purposefully.”