New Phase -- Portland Providence Clinical Trial

I'm in a new phase of the trial. Not an official "phase". But my last infusion was in January. I had an end-of-April scan and whatever it is they see on the images, is stable-to-slightly-smaller. For the purpose of the trial, they want me to get scans at 3-month intervals for the next year.

Saw this article in the WSJ the other day. One of the two drugs I received, Opdivo, is mentioned in the article. Like the other drug mentioned, Keytruda, Opdivo is an "Anti-PD1" treatment, meaning the two drugs are very similar. One interesting point the article makes is, "Researchers still haven't determined how long patients should take the drugs." My trial was 96 weeks, just shy of two years.

(Click on pic to see whole article.)

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2nd talk with Surgeon

Found out more about the VATS procedure today. They'll remove a nodule, and then keep me on the table while it's biopsied. If it is positive, they'll get more material, then wrap up. If the biopsy comes back negative, they'll do another nodule... and biopsy again and wait... not sure how many times they'll repeat. I guess I'm hoping for a long procedure. The surgeon said he'll ask the lab to freeze some of the material so that I could have it retrieved at a later time... mentioned I was getting a second opinion from UCSF cancer center, and that UCSF may therefore be interested in getting some of the sample as well.

Cyberknife 11/9-10

Underwent 2 cyberknife sessions, the first to treat the tumor bed of the first brain tumor, the second to treat the second one that showed up recently. The procedure is pretty straightforward, it's outpatient. The picture shows the mask they made for me which holds my head in place so the laser is accurate. Each session was an hour or so. I should know by the end of the weekend if there are any short-term complications (none I hope). Then it's a matter of letting the radiation do its job over the next couple of months. Then re-scanning to see both how the two treated areas are doing, and also to see if anything new shows up in the brain.

Cycle 4/Course 2 Finished

(8/6-8/9/2010) Finished cycle 4/course 2. Stopped this time due to some combination of high white T cell count, neurotoxicity and maybe something else. Tolerated 4 bags out of a total of 14, felt as bad as the other times where I tolerated more doses. Will get more scans in about 5 weeks time, and see what they look like compared to the last sets.

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