The Plan

This is Dr. Guido Tricot, The head Doctor and Research Director over the Multiple Myeloma Clinic. I put my Trust in him and my Faith in God.

We met with Dr. Tricot at Huntsman on Monday. We were very impressed with him. He said that he treats about 160 patients with multiple myeloma a year compared to most hospitals which treat 5 or 6. His treatment is more agressive, but he also offers hope for a longer remission. So here is the plan. Before I can begin treatments with Huntsman we have to make sure all the insurance issues are covered and authorized. Then I will begin by having a central port put in my chest. which means less pokes in the future. After those two things are done, I will begin four days of chemo. Which will be administered through the port from a backpack. So I guess you could say the backpack I'm using to start climbing this mountain is filled with weapons to fight off the cancer. Not exactly what I had in mind when I spoke of packing a backpack in my previous post! After the first round of chemo there will be about three weeks where my immunities will be very low. Hunstman requires that I stay within 20-30 minutes from the hospital, so I will be staying with my Parents in Centerville. When my blood levels get to a certain point they will begin to harvest my stem cells. These cells are usually located within the bone marrow but the chemo makes them come out into the bloodstream. This first phase of treatment is called D-PACE which is an acronym for the different types of chemo I will be taking. So here are the good things 1. The type of myeloma I have is slow growing. 2. One of the tests they did on the biopsy-from bone and marrow samples shows that there is no genetic damage-which means better chances of a positive outcome with the bone marrow transplant. Here are the not so good things 1. I will most likely not be home for Christmas. 2. a million different fears that constantly run through my mind.