(no subject)
Just got to work after seeing my oncologist this morning -- so of course, rather than doing any work, I'm posting to let you know the news.
After three months with no chemo, my tumor marker number is up a little, but it's not "alarming." Dr. Smith couldn't feel any tumors in a physical exam, either. So we're going to continue another three months with no chemo, and hope that things remain the same. In August if my number has climbed significantly, or she finds evidence of tumors, then we'll do a CT scan and start some type of chemo again.
The idea is to deal with my cancer as a chronic illness, and try to manage it as best we can. We know that I'm not cancer-free, but if the cancer is growing slowly we can gain time between rounds of chemo, and that should help the chemo drugs be more effective when we go back to them. Cancer cells develop resistance to the chemo drugs, and the rest of my body suffers toxic effects without gaining much ground on the cancer. So the idea is to switch off and try different therapies, rather than staying in chemo forever.
Dr. Smith also prescribed a drug for me that interferes with the action of hormones in the body. This will help if my cancer cells are sensitive to hormones (meaning that there are hormone receptors on the surface of the tumors, and the tumors are encouraged to grow by hormones in my body). I know, this sounds very vague -- the information I found says that no one really knows exactly why these drugs work, but they've been effective in breast cancer treatment. I guess I should ask you all to pray that my cancer turns out to be hormone-sensitive, so that we can buy a lot of time with this type of therapy.
So, that's the scoop. I'm very happy and grateful to have another three months without chemo.
After three months with no chemo, my tumor marker number is up a little, but it's not "alarming." Dr. Smith couldn't feel any tumors in a physical exam, either. So we're going to continue another three months with no chemo, and hope that things remain the same. In August if my number has climbed significantly, or she finds evidence of tumors, then we'll do a CT scan and start some type of chemo again.
The idea is to deal with my cancer as a chronic illness, and try to manage it as best we can. We know that I'm not cancer-free, but if the cancer is growing slowly we can gain time between rounds of chemo, and that should help the chemo drugs be more effective when we go back to them. Cancer cells develop resistance to the chemo drugs, and the rest of my body suffers toxic effects without gaining much ground on the cancer. So the idea is to switch off and try different therapies, rather than staying in chemo forever.
Dr. Smith also prescribed a drug for me that interferes with the action of hormones in the body. This will help if my cancer cells are sensitive to hormones (meaning that there are hormone receptors on the surface of the tumors, and the tumors are encouraged to grow by hormones in my body). I know, this sounds very vague -- the information I found says that no one really knows exactly why these drugs work, but they've been effective in breast cancer treatment. I guess I should ask you all to pray that my cancer turns out to be hormone-sensitive, so that we can buy a lot of time with this type of therapy.
So, that's the scoop. I'm very happy and grateful to have another three months without chemo.