I feel a bit like the football coach whose team is leading 30-0 with 5 minutes left to play in the 4th quarter. I'm almost certain we're going to win the game, but I'm not ready to declare victory until the final gun goes off. Today the best case scenario came true. As I knew she would, Susan (no ordinary person you're dealing with) attracted the maximum amount of enthusiasm from Dr. Kavanagh, the principal investigator. He cleared her for the clinical trial, and wants her to start ASAP (meaning Tuesday or Wednesday). The only remaining hurdle is that the drug company sponsor, Telik, has to grant her an exception to start one week earlier than the protocol calls for (4 weeks after major surgery). Lisa, the research nurse, seems to think the paperwork associated with said exception will take most of the day tomorrow and so has suggested that we need to stay over Tues. night anticipating a Weds. chemo treatment. In the meantime, Susan had to get a fresh CT scan which took from 5:30 to 8:45 PM this evening--which is the reason I'm doing this update so late tonight. Tomorrow she's scheduled for an EKG and a chest XRay. Then we will simply wait the rest of the day for the paperwork to come through, which in the best case will result in a chemo tomorrow.
Susan usually is pretty sick after any CT scan because of the barium drink (3 bottles) she has to consume. However, tonight she is so far not complaining at all, and just finished a late dinner of pasta. Again, a best case scenario. Stay tuned for how the game turns out when we update this page tomorrow. We appreciate your prayers--which so far seem to be answered with a YES!
Posted by John Dishman at February 17, 2003 10:46 PM