Saturday, January 7, 2012

The "Official Result"

Sorry for the delay. I spoke with Dr. B a couple of days ago, and he said that the board confirmed that basically the changes are so minute as to not raise flags. Basically this means I will check it out again in another month. Good news? Works for me!

There is also another trial that I might qualify for, though I need to have my liver behave first. I'll be getting that blood test next week.

Wednesday, January 4, 2012

The "Unofficial Result"? Stable!

Basically the MRI today looked the same as the MRI taken a month ago. Basically. As in, if you don't look too carefully. Or if you add in the variables like "they were taken with a different MRI device" or "the alignment was slightly different". And really, who needs details?

Ok, maybe you need details. So here's where it really stands. Today's image did look oh-so-slightly bigger than the last image. Tomorrow Dr. B will be presenting my brain to the Tumor Board to see what they all have to say. Hopefully they will think that it hasn't grown significantly enough to do anything other than continue monitoring. That said, there was a fair amount of discussion surrounding future options. And no, they are not all that different from things I've already considered.

Good news? Yes, at this point I think of it as good news. As I've mentioned before, if this spot stays basically the same size for the rest of my life, I'll have no qualms with that. Of course, I'm guessing some of you are wondering...how does any of this make him "stable"?!?

Amazing paper on the complexity of cancer

This paper was written by my (genius) cousin. It really does frame the complexity of cancer treatment (among other diseases). It also made me appreciate the chemo I was just on, as its intent was to cut off several paths in the growth of a tumor, not just one - as simpler chemo treatments have always done.

Meanwhile, my next MRI is this afternoon, so I'll post more then.