Big picture

• Neupogen injection at Siteman West County

Dr. T called me today to review what we had talked about during my appointment yesterday. He wanted to remind me of the big picture, that I have only one abdominal tumor that showed growth on my January scans, that my last Guardant testing number was down, that I've been feeling pretty good... and that it's just the damn (my word) CEA that has us with our tails up (again, paraphrasing here). So... what if there was something that we could do about that abdominal tumor that might lower my CEA (an indicator of the tumor load on my body) and allow us to resume maintenance chemo? Well.................. there might be. Dr. T is going to forward my records to Dr. P, one of the radiation oncologists that was involved with the Y90 procedure on my liver last summer. From my blog last July: "I talked to Dr. P this morning. He was easy to talk to on the phone... and I am rarely comfortable on the phone talking about all of this medical stuff." In addition to being medically talented, being able to communicate comfortably with me is also up there on my list of important physician qualities.

1. Medically talented
2. Able to communicate comfortably with me
3. Superhero

So now we wait to hear from Dr. P. There are multiple radiation options that Dr. T thinks might be relevant but he differs to Dr. P's expertise. Dr. P will need to review my scans to determine what might be possible and the risks involved. I look forward to hopefully getting to see him again.