Thursday, May 26, 2011

It's been a week of nerves. I had PET scan Tuesday morning to see if the new chemo regiment was working. Everything went well test wise although some day they are doing to use me to light the city. For those of you not familiar with PET scans (Positron emission tomography) you are hooked up to an IV and they inject radioactive (tracer) solution into your body which attaches itself to the tumors and basically highlights them. Once you are injected you must relax (in a recliner) and not exert yourself (they won't even let you read because holding the book tenses up your upper muscles) for about 1.5 hours while the tracer circulates within your body. Once that is complete they pull the IV and you lie on a table and scans for 30 minutes on a machine that also does CAT (Computerized Axial Tomography) and it gives them a 3D image of what is going on. (Don't you all feel real smart now?) The reason my doc does a PET Scan vs. a CAT Scan is that a PET shows both hard (bones) and soft tissue whereas a CAT only picks up soft tissue. In my case I would have to have both a CAT and a Bone Scan in order to see what's happening. BTY - a PET scan is Approx $9,000 and a CAT is $3,000. Thank God for insurance! So anyway - the test went off as usual and it was a waiting game until yesterday afternoon when I had a doc appt before chemo.

As you could imagine it was a long 24+ hours waiting to hear the results. Well it wasn't bad news but it wasn't exactly good news. Just OK news. The scan showed that the bone lesions are reducing in size but the liver tumors increased slightly. Best news is that no new tumors were detected. After talking to the doctor it was decided to stay on this chemo regiment of the "industrial strength" chemo IV as well as the 8 pills a day chemo for two more rounds.

All and all I feel good except for fatigue. Not complaining - I could live with being tired.

As soon as I get more info I'll keep you all informed.

Thanks all for your prayers and support!