April 9, 2013

Hi, yo damien A W A YYYYYY!

Posted by Derek under Conventional Medicine, Faith | Tags: , , , , , , , |
[5] Comments 

Folks, the Chemosabe gang is at it again.

I started chemo again today. You may recall that I had chemo with the very popular pancreatic cancer drug, Gemcitabine, back in November. At the same time docs put a stent in my bile duct. Since the two chemo doses came so close to when I had the stent placed, it was hard at the time to tell whether the side effects I was feeling at the time were from the stent placement, or the chemo.

So, I stopped the chemo at the time to see if I could improve my strength, which I have.

I went off hospice on Friday. The people at Hospice Austin could not have been any better. But since hospice is designed to help the patient who has less than six months to live, the hospice doctors said that I no longer fit into that category.

Carlos Santana

Carlos Santana (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Coincidental with all this is that during 2012 there was a long of talk in the pancreatic support groups about some great results coming from clinical trials with a drug called Abraxane. When I first heard the name, I thought it was the name of an album by Carlos Santana. I was slightly off; it’s called “Abraxas.”

Abraxane is very popular with breast cancer patients because it has helped those patients for their treatment and recovery. Fourth quarter 2012 I started hearing much more buzz about how Abraxane was showing strong results in clinical trials for pancreatic cancer treatment. It was not yet approved for pancreatic cancer patients, though. Then shortly after dawn of 2013, it was approved by FDA for treatment for pancreatic cancer patients after years of developing good results for breast cancer patients.

Meanwhile, after the stent placement I started getting stronger and putting some weight back on. I was feeling stronger.

So, the first three Tuesdays of every month going forward I will be getting chemo with Gencitabine and Abraxane. The only pain associated with the chemo is that applying the needle to my port hurts for that quick moment of insertion, but the chemicals don’t hurt during infusion. But, as we go forward and I get more doses under my belt, who knows what effect the chemo will have. Every treatment is different for every patient.

A special note: Those of you who have been following this fight with damien know that Patti and I have forged through this fight with a lot of logical thinking but a larger part of faith and prayers. I know there are family and friends who pray for us, and I made the decision to try again after a lot of prayer. This does not in any way mean that I have lost my faith. After considerable thought and prayer, I felt like this was an answer to prayer.

It wasn’t an easy decision. The sheet the doctor gave us about Abraxane shows about a 10:1 side effect ratio. Potentially, lots of the suckers. Things like appetite loss (who cares about that, I never have had one any way?), nausea, lose my hair (you can use this space to enter your joke about my potential hair loss), and others. I don’t want to bore you with other potential things we’ll be looking for.

As always, thank you all for your prayers and well wishes. We really do appreciate them. God bless you all.

 

November 20, 2012

A new day

Posted by Derek under Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , |
[3] Comments 

“When the world says, ‘Give up’, Hope whispers, ‘Try it one more time.'” — Anonymous

Today, the family and I learned how quickly despair can turn to hope.

We were a bit despondent when we left the hospital on Sunday. It appeared that all the doctors at the hospital wanted us to meet with an oncologist to decide next steps. While they did try to give us choices, there weren’t many. Frankly, we thought the docs at the hospital just wanted to put the burden on the oncologist to tell us that we’ve pretty much done what there is to do.

So, we met Dr. Jerry at 8:45 am at Texas Oncology. If you are not from Austin, Texas, Texas Oncology is a very large organization that focuses specifically on oncology and nothing else. They have a whole slough of offices here. My friend, Bryan, who is recovering very well from throat cancer, recommended Dr. Jerry, so we made an appointment with him before last week’s hospital visit, just in case.

So, when we arrived, we had mixed feelings. We were expecting bad news.

After I filled out papers that seemed to want to know everything about me except my underwear size, we were shepherded into an office.

Dr. Jerry came in and introduced himself. From that moment on, we were just overwhelmed. Never have I seen such an optimistic, caring, confident, energetic individual with such enthusiasm and love for the work he does.

He was completely up to date on all the scans and MRI. He knew the outcomes from the hospital stay. When we had questions about chemo, or any of the next steps we may have, he let us know that hope was on the horizon and there were numerous options, BUT there were some priorities.

While we were in the room, he got on the phone to make appointments with his most trusted gastrointerologist. He was confident that the ERCP procedure that was not successful Sunday, was a temporary setback. “We can turn that around, I know,” he said.

Gemcitabine

Gemcitabine

We had discussions about chemo and the effects of gemcitabine on quality of life. He was straightforward and gave us straight answers to all our questions. Plus, from some recent research we had heard that there was a report coming out in January that claims that gemcitabine combined with another drug, Abraxane, had been experiencing some remarkable results in treatment of pancreatic cancer. He knew all about that and shared information with us about that combination.

So, after our visit with Dr. Jerry, we had appointments to meet the new gastro guy and to start the next step on removing the bile obstruction. We also had an appointment to learn more about gemcitabine and begin chemo treatment.

So, yes, chemo is on the near horizon, but we are strengthened by our faith and we know that we have not run out of hope.

“Hope is like a road in the country; there was never a road, but when many people walk on it, the road comes into existence.” — Lin Yutang

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