Comments on: Bald Women Lash Out At Sanofi-Aventis & Taxotere

By: Bald Women

Bald Women — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 00:48:48 +0000

That is a sad thing to see. Women love their hair and baldness for women is a very hard fact to accept.

By: Kathy

Kathy — Sat, 25 Jun 2011 18:36:39 +0000

The comments I’m seeing here — blaming the patients for being crybabies — are absolutely apalling. What the f**k is wrong with you people?

Here’s the reality:

(1) Taxotere has a very close cousin, Taxol, which is widely used to treat BC and does NOT cause permanent baldness. It’s JUST as effective (they are within 1% of each other in preventing relapse)

(2) Society treats bald women like FREAKS

Given 1 + 2, if you can’t understand why these women are mad, you are an idiot. And even if you can’t understand, your leap to judgment puts you in the bottom 10% of humanity. I’m very, very bummed if you are old enough to vote!

By: Denise

Denise — Fri, 25 Feb 2011 20:58:26 +0000

I was not given a choice of drugs. I was told that I would be given this drug (Taxotere). I was told of its side effects, but permanent hair loss was not one of the side effects. It’s been 2 years since then, and my hair is thin and very sparse. It’s hard to celebrate being cancer free when you still look like you are going through treatment.

By: Denise

Denise — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 21:29:39 +0000

Thea, I believe you are missing the point. This has much less to do with permanent alopecia, than it does with non-disclosure by a greedy industry giant. Sanofi-aventis was issued a warning from the FDA nearly a year ago which states they are guilty of “Unsubtantiated Superiority Claims/Overstatement of Efficacy”. This is after the FDA investigated numerous trials and studies. In short, this means SA misreprented clinical trial data, to promote their drug, now why would they do that? Oh yea, kaching!!! Consequently I was treated with, not only an inferior drug, but one that left me permanently disfigured. They continue to pedal their drugs without disclosing this information and it is no only inexcusable, but in my opinion, criminal.

By: shirley

shirley — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 08:38:54 +0000

With all due respect Thea, its a totally different ball game when its related to cancer!

By: Thea Chassin

Thea Chassin — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 19:45:32 +0000

Bald Girls Do Lunch at baldgirlsdolunch.org is the award winning nonprofit created by a woman with alopecia universalis for the millions with various forms of alopecia areata (the autoimmune hair loss disease). We know very well the shock and mourning loss that women go through when suffering a drastic change to self-image. We also know, since many of us either lost all our body hair (everywhere) in childhood or during teen years (AA can come at any time of life)that life without hair is an opportunity for enriched self awareness, beauty, values and standards. We know firsthand that successful life, love, relationships and sexuality having little to do with hair.

Living in a culture that’s obsessed with hair as a prime measure of confidence, beauty and femininity means that us hair less women need to work harder to feel normal and whole especially losing eyebrows and eyelashes. On the plus side, think of the cost and pain women endure to remove all their hair below the neck!

The sense of body loss, loss of control and not seeing our old selves looking back at us in the mirror is a real feeling. It’s a process to evolve and adapt to a new version of ourselves…but every woman can do it with grace and style. She has to do it because no one else is going to do it for her.

Just ask the women of Bald Girls Do Lunch….many of whom became alopecians in elem, middle, high school or college. The grieving stages and anger are normal. But when that’s over, look around at the bald, healthy children and adults today who have autoimmune alopecias. It helps puts the loss from drug-induced alopecia in perspective and that gets women back in the driver’s seat of their own self-image faster.

Friends and family mean well and say “it’s only hair”. So find other women to talk to and the feelings of being alone alopecia will dissipate.

Thea Chassin, founder and president
Bald Girls Do Lunch Inc
http://www.baldgirlsdolunch.org
info@baldgirlsdolunch.org

By: John

John — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 20:32:07 +0000

Thx Lisa also, did not see your note at first.

By: John

John — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 20:23:09 +0000

Thanks Ed, I understand the issue better now.

By: Jonathan Richman

Jonathan Richman — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 19:13:51 +0000

To add some additional complexity, this almost certainly is not an official sanofi-aventis Facebook page. A few give aways here, but the biggest is that they don’t use the proper branding for the company. It’s “sanofi-aventis” and the page is “Sanofi aventis” with a capital “S” and no dash. There’s no way someone in S-A signed off on this page.

Question is…now what? Do you complain to Facebook, which would get the page deleted almost instantly or do you respond? I’d clearly go for the former. Not perfect social media participation, but there are bigger legal implications to allowing people to use your trademarks and pose as an official company representative.

Jonathan
Dose of Digital

By: Ed Silverman

Ed Silverman — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 18:46:21 +0000

Hi John,

From what I gather, the group wants more info disclosed about the risk of permanent hair loss from Taxotere. The story in the Globe & Mail quotes a doctor saying that he offers both Taxol and Taxotere to patients, although one apparently has a higher risk of permanent hair loss than the other. The women believe this sort of contrast isn’t fully or properly explained often enough. I’ve no idea how many, if any would decline treatment for breast cancer though.

I hope that helps,
ed