Hi Keith, welcome... Here's the prescribing info from the manufacturer of Zometa where you can look up your symptoms.  Muscle/joint/bone pain are all side effects of any of the bisphosphonates, including Zometa (see page 5 [5.6] Musculoskeletal Pain).  Since you say most of the cancer is in the sacrum, then that would cause pain there as well.  As you know, the sacrum is just below your lumbar spine and close to your hip.

Since you also have herniated discs, then these can cause pain in your lumbar spine.  I'm so sorry to hear about the prostate mets.  Just to be on the safe side, I would notify your prescribing Dr. of your symptoms in you rt femur and hip, and anything else you are concerned about to have this checked thoroughly.  You may also want to get an MRI to see what's going on, if your Dr. will order it, x-rays could be done as well but some fractures don't show up on them consistently.  There is a warning on all long-term bisphosphonate (BP) use, and one of the precautions is pain in the groin, femur or hip.  Even though 10 months isn't considered long-term use, I would still look into this to see if you might have a fracture.  Hopefully that's not the case, but here's an article I wrote with links to the American Society of Bone and Mineral Research about atypical fractures with BP use.

As far as increasing you meds, you'd have to ask you Dr about that since we couldn't advise you on a situation like that-sorry.

Good luck and let us know what you find out.

Pam Flores, Health Guide

11/ 4/10 6:06pm

Hi again Keith, one thing I wanted to mention, is that if your pain meds aren't working you should NEVER feel like a criminal in asking for more help.  Maybe the Dr. could prescribe something else that's more effective for you, but please don't suffer in silence, that never works!  You have a right to be treated with the most appropriate pain treatment necessary.

 

Good luck to you!