Another battle begins

Terry started her new regimen a few days ago. They have added cytoxan to her velade and high dose i.v. dexamethasone. She will be on this for one cycle and then revlimid will be added. The velcade causes her to get some severe bone pain, especially in her sternum and right hip. So she is on two narcotics to help with the pain. She will suffer a lot of pain before taking either of the narcotics. She is keeping up her spirits and always has a positive attitude. She is a lot stronger person that I would be in the same situation.
Her PET scan came back and as we expected her myeloma is fairly diffuse among her long bones and a few other bones that produce marrow. She also has a few soft tissue problems that we are told will go away with the myeloma when the therapy works. Now we have to HOPE (our theme) that the new chemo cocktail does what we want.
This is another battle to fight in the war against multiple myeloma. Please keep your prayers coming for Terry. God bless you all.

HOPE springs eternal

Frank Sinatra once sang the lyrics, "You gotta have HOPE, all you really need is HOPE." Well, we got some HOPE with the myeloma specialist. He ran a battery of tests and in a week Terry will have her first PET scan. I was thinking I could just wave our cat Lacey over her and that would suffice. That wouldn't get any information and we would tick off the cat.
After she has the PET scan Terry will go back on 3 meds, Velcade, dexamethasone and Cytoxan. She will be on that regimen for 3 weeks and then Revlimid will be added at a higher dose than she has taken in the past. The physician said that Terry will then be on this group of 4 medications for 2-3 more cycles before another bone marrow biopsy is done. Each cycle is 3 weeks in length. He gave us a lot of HOPE as he has had good successes with others like Terry who have relapsed after a transplant and then became refractory to whatever they were taking. He doesn't think she needs any trial protocol or investigational drugs at this point. So HOPE is where we are. I know that with our prayers and yours this course of medical treatment will fill the bill.
God bless you all and stay safe.

A huge pothole

The last update I mentioned that Terry's transplant had failed and she would be getting a new one, this time using her sister's stem cells. Things are not going according to plan. In order to get Terry ready for another transplant she has been on a heavy duty chemo agent called Velcade along with some high dose dexamethasone. She had a bone marrow biopsy last week and it shows that the treatment isn't doing anything. Until she can get the cancer cells down to an acceptable level in her marrow, she is not a candidate for any kind of transplant. This coming Friday Terry has an appointment with a renowned myeloma specialist at the Univ. of Michigan. Hopefully he will have something in his bag of tricks that will work; maybe an experimental new drug or a trial protocol? In the meantime please keep praying for her.
God bless you all.

Another year and some bad news

Terry had her 1 year post transplant appointment with her transplant specialist. We were hoping and praying that her stem cells would keep her in remission for a while, but they pooped out and her bone marrow cancer is back. She will be starting a course of chemotherapy next week and it appears she will be getting chemo on an intermittent basis for the next 2-3 months. At that time she will be put through a bunch of tests to see if she is ready for another stem cell transplant. Last year she received her own cells. Although she has plenty of her own cells in frozen storage the medical opinion is to receive someone else's cells. The good news is that Terry's sister Helen is a perfect match. Helen is a wonderful lady and is more than willing to give her cells to help her sister.
There is some more good news. Terry will be able to travel to her home town of Rome, NY to spend Christmas with her family. Last year she was in the hospital for Christmas. I will be updating this blog as more news and events transpire.
In the meantime we wish you all a happy and holy Christmas.

'TIS A PUZZLEMENT

Well, nobody can explain why Terry's blood pressure and hemoglobin plummeted. As the King of Siam said, "'Tis a puzzlement."
Terry's blood pressure and hemoglobin are both normal and her cancer cells, which were making a bit of a resurgence are retreating. Today was all GOOD news. There is no tenable medical reason why what happened happened. It just might be that God is working in His mysterious ways again.

SHE'S FREE

The docs all agreed that Terry is too healthy to be in the hospital, so the wardens set her free. Her discharge diagnosis was acute dehydration. Now we have to find what caused that and what the long term ramifications are. Needless to say, everyone is glad to have her at home. Thanks for all the good thoughts and prayers.

BUMP UPDATE

She looks good-but that is like judging a book by its cover. The Hospitalist came in and told us Terry's hemoglobin was looking good and that her blood pressure was close to normal. He is a bit worried about her renal function and the underscoring cause of these latest problems. He changed a few of her meds, cut her i.v. in half and told us we have to wait for the blood and urine tests to come back. Terry's renal ultrasound looked good from a macroscopic view-now we need to know from a microscopic perspective.
The good news was the Oncologist came by and as far as he s concerned Terry could have been discharged today. The Nephrologist never came in today. It is the Hospitalist's call as to her release date. Looks like she has one in favor of letting her out and we wait on the other two.
Maybe tomorrow????