They are starting Chemo & Radiation on Jerry today at 2:30 pm (CST). They hope to be able to slow the growth and if lucky, eliminate some of the Cancer in his body. The chemo/radiation will be a 15 day process.
Not sure at this point if we'll be trekking to MD Anderson. For now, staying put in KC at KUMed and getting this treated.
Thursday, January 8, 2009
A Sucker Punch to the Gut
Well, overnight things have gone from not great - to just darn right not good at all, dare I say- even bad.
Jerry is now in the ICU at KUMed. They put him there last evening as his heart rate was extremely low and they were taking some precautionary measures. They managed to get that stabilized, but kept him in in ICU for monitoring and "just in case" his heart or blood pressure dropped again. They have him hooked up to a feeding tube so he is now getting nutrition back into his body (yeah!) as well as an IV with fluids to keep him hydrated.
They also took another CAT scan of his body last night just to check things out.
...and that's where things went South....
The tumor has now grown to the size of a basketball. His Lymph nodes are severly swollen with Cancer at this point, and that is also making it diffucult for him to breath & swallow. Both of these combined is what is causing Jerry so much pain as well as his loss of appetite.
The Cancer has also spread to several more parts of his body, including more in the bones and one lung. They have determined that he has a "solid" Cancer and not a blood Cancer (which is a good step in the right direction on figuring this out), but still unsure the origin of the Primary Cancer cells.
The Oncologist and Radiologist are supposed to come in today ASAP and figure out what we can do from here. They want to start him on radiation IMMEDIATELY to try and reduce the size of the tumor and see if it helps things or not.
At this point, not really sure how things are going to progress. In the 5 weeks since Jerry was diagnosed, this Cancer has spread rapidly and with a viciousness that is unrivaled.
Please say an extra prayer/thought/chant for him today if you have the time. I have a feeling he is going to need everything he can get.
Once we know more from the doctors, I'll re-post information to keep you updated, but for now... a grim outlook.
Jerry is now in the ICU at KUMed. They put him there last evening as his heart rate was extremely low and they were taking some precautionary measures. They managed to get that stabilized, but kept him in in ICU for monitoring and "just in case" his heart or blood pressure dropped again. They have him hooked up to a feeding tube so he is now getting nutrition back into his body (yeah!) as well as an IV with fluids to keep him hydrated.
They also took another CAT scan of his body last night just to check things out.
...and that's where things went South....
The tumor has now grown to the size of a basketball. His Lymph nodes are severly swollen with Cancer at this point, and that is also making it diffucult for him to breath & swallow. Both of these combined is what is causing Jerry so much pain as well as his loss of appetite.
The Cancer has also spread to several more parts of his body, including more in the bones and one lung. They have determined that he has a "solid" Cancer and not a blood Cancer (which is a good step in the right direction on figuring this out), but still unsure the origin of the Primary Cancer cells.
The Oncologist and Radiologist are supposed to come in today ASAP and figure out what we can do from here. They want to start him on radiation IMMEDIATELY to try and reduce the size of the tumor and see if it helps things or not.
At this point, not really sure how things are going to progress. In the 5 weeks since Jerry was diagnosed, this Cancer has spread rapidly and with a viciousness that is unrivaled.
Please say an extra prayer/thought/chant for him today if you have the time. I have a feeling he is going to need everything he can get.
Once we know more from the doctors, I'll re-post information to keep you updated, but for now... a grim outlook.
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