Great News!!

Dad had his doctor appointment this morning to go over the scan results and the doctor walked in and said "Good News!" (We like to hear those words start the conversation off!!!) I just KNEW it! He said that there is NO NEW GROWTH and everything is STABLE! The spots we have been worried about on his neck report as "thickening of cells" and seem to be on the surface. Radiation can take care of those! Again, we face the hurdle of him having been radiated already in that area. There is great concern for the healthy tissues and blood vessels, etc in the area that would be re-radiated. However, the farther we get away from the last radiation treatment the better, and it has been over a year now. I'm feeling good about it!

So here is the plan...His body definitely needs a break from Chemo so that if off the table for now. Radiation is what we need. He has an appointment with Dr. Hardacre at 2:00 on Thursday. We are going to start there and see if we are comfortable with the treatment options and what he thinks we should do. There are new, more direct radiation options available since the last time Dad had radiation and we are hoping this will benefit him. I read that it has been used successfully with patients who have had radiation and then recurrent tumors in the same area because of its more precise dosages. Please pray that this is what will work for Dad. I will know more about all the options on Thursday afternoon and I will let you know then.

He is going to keep him on Erbitux in 3 week increments for now. If you remember, Erbitux is an antibody chemotherapy that works very well with radiation so he wants to keep him on it once per week until we KNOW the radiation plan. He will get this on Mondays.

He also has an appointment with a GI next week to discuss getting his esophagus stretched. I am so glad he is ready to talk about that! The doctor said it wasn't a big deal to have done ( yeah, if it is NOT your esophagus I'm talking about..ha!) and he would really be able to eat better. Since he has been on a soft/liquid diet for nearly 2 years his esophagus has gotten smaller making it difficult to get larger pieces of food down. I will let you know more about that after the appointment.

The infection is his leg is MUCH better. The heavy doses of antibiotics really worked.

Our God is so good all the time! I am thrilled with the news today.

"Behold, we count those blessed who endured. You have heard of the endurance of Job and have seen the outcome of the Lord's dealings, that the Lord is full of compassion and is merciful." James 5:11