New treatment plan

Today was treatment day. It seemed to go pretty well. It took about an hour in total from the time I entered the treatment room until it was over. A few more things that I found out today: 1. I got a BIG dose since my study of shunting was so favorable so I got a total of 116 Gray. 2. Since I got such a big dose, I really should not have another for at least 3-4 months if it is necessary. The healthy liver tissue needs that much time to heal. 3. As a part of the protocol you get pre-emptive scripts of a steroids pack, prevacid, and anti-biotics to help prevent ulceration, acid problems, a reaction to the radiation, and to help keep up energy. 4. That physicians who have access to recent raw data are very optimistic about this treatment and indicate that studies on this data will reveal good things about this treatment.

I was especially happy to hear about the big dose and that it would be about 4 months before I would be evaluated to see if I need a 2nd dose. The break from all of this travel out to Mayo Clinic will be VERY nice. Not that I don’t think it’s the best place to be for medical care – we just need a break from here. Also, due to my particular situation and minimal shunting I could have 5 total doses of this before I reach my max on the liver. That is almost unheard of and most people have 1 or 2 total treatments, occasionally 3. I’ll push the limits and do as many as I need to as long as progress is made.

I was released and told to stay in town overnight just to keep an eye on the puncture site. It would be good to be close by if it decided to start bleeding out. So tomorrow morning we start the long trip back home and will work with Mayo over the phone if needed over the next several months and otherwise rely on my local Docs (I’m not super impressed with my local docs, if I haven’t mentioned that before). I can’t wait to get back into my own bed again though.

So far I haven’t had anything substantial for side effects for the treatments, but it is still early. The only thing noteworth is that soon after the spheres were fed in through the catheter I did experience a little bit of sharp pain. This was promptly taken care of with another dose of fentynal. I’m still waiting to see what the fatigue is like because I’ve heard that is a crushing side effect. Hopefully that one just skips me completely.

So – as I promised – I will keep updating this thread until I feel that I’ve offered up all of the information I think could possibly be useful to someone else. Pardon me if it gets a little bit wordy or if much of what I say doesn’t apply, my intention is just to help others considering this route of therapy in the future.

Thank you all for your outpouring of support as well. Several of you have visited my Caringbridge Website and left some encouraging comments for me. It is much appreciated.

Rick

Well………….. I am packing my bags right now and leaving tomorrow morning for the trip to Mayo. I must say it hasn’t gone as smoothly this time around for transportation and lodging, but it will work. I’m quite anxious/nervous about the upcoming radioemobolization procedure with Theraspheres and I hope that it is effective and kicks this cancer’s butt. So we arrive Wednesday night with some bloodwork and planning appointments on Thursday and then the procedure Friday morning. I am to stay overnight to make sure that there is no bleeding from the entry point and then we travel home on Saturday.

I will let you all know how this goes and then at the followup CT scans how effective it has been. Hopefully this collection of data will help others as they make treatment choices down the road.

Thank you all for your support and help.

Rick