Today's Visit

My Dad sent me an email summarizing today's visit...it covers it all.  So, I just copied and pasted :-)  The doctor got a copy of the scan from M.D. Anderson, and thankfully, there was nothing new.  Below, you will see discussion about 3 tumors....Matthew does only have 1 on his liver.  Additionally, my Dad said that the doctor was very upbeat, and Matthew seemed in generally good spirits.

Just got back from visiting Dr. Falcon, the local oncologist who will doing the chemo.

 

First off, I pressed him as hard as I could about Matthew’s prognosis. Basically, it comes down to this: if he responds to the chemo he should completely recover. With respect to the liver tumor, it has to be operable. There is a region in the liver where a bunch of plumbing comes together. If the tumor is there, you are pretty much a goner – they wouldn’t have even attempted chemo. But Matthew’s tumor is in a very favorable position – on the upper dome of the liver and they can whack off a large part of that area. On a slightly negative note, Matthew’s tumor is also a little on the large size (6 cm) and they would like it to be more in the 2-3 cm range for surgery. If the tumor responds to the chemo it should shrink down to that range.

 

I then  pressed Dr. Falcon for a worst case scenario. He would not lay one out because he said that even if the chemo fails, there are still some back-up therapies that can be tried – in particular oblation of the tumor (sticking a catheter into the tumor and killing it with microwaves or alcohol).

 

I also asked him about the “3 tumors or less” factor that Mom (Amanda) had turned up (your chances improve greatly if you have 3 tumors or less on the liver). He actually was quite familiar with this factor and reiterated that this was in Matthew’s favor. Most liver centers actually use this as a cut-off as to whether or not they can remove all of them and still leave you with enough functioning liver.

 

Finally, the schedule for the next week. Despite what seems like endless delays, we aren’t really running too far behind a best-case schedule. Since the chemo interferes with healing after surgery, they usually wait at least 4 weeks after surgery before they start using chemo. We are just a few days past that now. Matthew still needs a “port “ (permanent IV hook-up). We will go see Dr. Thompson (Matthew’s original surgeon) tomorrow (Wed) for a preliminary visit, and then will probably have the port procedure done as an out-patient procedure at Brazosport Hospital on Friday. Then we will probably start the first round of chemo next Monday.

 

Love to all,

Dad