Monday, January 22, 2007

WOW! It's been a crazy day! I'm not sure where to start so I guess let's lead off with the good news!

Bill and Earl are all alone!!! The PET/CT shows that boys are the only hot spots - it has not spread any further than that!!! Whew! We are breathing again!

So, where do we go from here? Dr. Reznick is ready to attach these guys and so am I, we have set up a tenative appointment for Wednesday afternoon to start on my base of Erbitux before we begin the RT. It will be administered once a week via IV, it takes about an hour once a week and I have already set up my next 7 appointments to get my treatments. We'll be going into the office tomorrow for a training session, done by the nurses, to educate on the drugs and what to expect. I cannot talk highly enough about the staff of Rocky Mountain Cancer Clinic - Parker especially Dr. Reznick. These folks are incredible at all they do and working with both myself and Andrea. The doctor speads time with us and explains everything, answers all of our questions and is truely interested in making sure I beat this cancer. I will be getting my blood tested on a weekly basis to make sure it is all good; CBC every other week and checking magnezium and other items every week.

Everyones big question, what is Erbitux? Well it's not chemo, it is a drug that works like chemo but without the nasty side effects. We could get into the science of it but I will let you read that part of it if you want to. The drug was released initially for use on Colorectal Cancer and got it's FDA approval for use on SCC last year. Dr. Reznick has had good success with it in conjunction with RT. Here are some links to more info regarding Erbitux:

http://www.spohnc.org/docs/erbitux.htm
http://www.spohnc.org/docs/FDA_News_Erbitux.htm
http://www.spohnc.org/docs/erbituxresponse.htm

I am also adding a couple of new links in the links section to SPOHNC and the Yul Brynner Foundation, a couple of sites dedicated to support and preventions of head and neck cancers.

I still have my appointment with Dr. Nemechek on Wednesday and Dr. Leonard on Thursday, and there we'll talk with him in regards to his game plan on my RT. I believe that it will probably be a M-F treatment plan but how many times a day, how long each treatment and how many weeks will be determined by the doc. I'll be doing a lot of typing this week!

It feels like a 700 pound gorilla has jumped off my back now knowing that it has not spead. I'll be updating the calendar with what we know so far.

Thanks to everyones kind words who have signed the guest book so far, it means a lot.