On December 8th we had our much anticipated meeting with the doctor at Dana Farber. He talked to us about Steve's tumors, explained that chemo was the recommended treatment -and some pretty violent chemo drugs at that. He also wanted to admit Steve to the hospital that very day so he could start him on fluids in preparation for chemo the next day. He said that Small Cell Pancreatic Cancer is very aggressive and very rare. Only 1% of patients have it originate in the Pancreas. Typically is starts in the lungs. Just to be sure, the dd a scan of Steve's lungs and thankfully they were clear.
While Small Cell is very aggressive it typically also responds well to treatment. They will do 2 rounds of 3 days each - 21 days apart. A few days before the 3rd round they will do a scan to see if the tumors are shrinking. We will pray it is good news by then. Steve had Chemo on the 9, 10 and 11th of this month. Other than still being very sick, he seemed to tolerate it well and went home on Saturday the 12th. On Sunday the nausea began but that was to be expected. We able the keep it under control with medication for the most part. Unfortunately for Steve he picked up a bacterial infection at the hospital but we didn't know it yet. As his symptoms worsened we called the doc and were back at Dana Farber Tuesday morning for tests and hydration. They called Wednesday to tell us about the test results and start antibiotics. Isn't modern medicine great? We can results that fast! So we start up yet another medicine. Poor guy he has a whole pharmacy by now. After a few doses it becomes apparent that the medicine does NOT agree with him.
I will continue tomorrow cause my battery is dying...
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