SIRT part 2

As you may have gathered, the six week follow up from my SIRT treatment was some time ago and once again we have had a series of ups and downs which I can only now bring myself to share.

At the six week post-SIRT mark we got very good news indeed. The SIRT was successful in that it shrunk my tumours and sent my CEA plummeting from 176 to 30. We were very pleased with this result as it is apparently uncommon for SIRT to actually shrink tumours, it is more likely to change the cell density and hold the disease stable for an average of 5 months. So at this point we took the good news, celebrated a little and held our breaths for what we hoped would be at least 5 or 6 months of stable disease.

However this was very short lived, as just four weeks later my CEA was back up to 53 indicating tumour growth once more. So even though the average is 5 months of stable disease, it looks like I got about 2 months (I guess that's the bugger about averages), and most of that was recovering from the SIRT which was a challenge in itself.

We got the news of the rising CEA just days before our daughter turned 5 and started school. It was a bitter sweet time as I had been told in November 2012 that I had about 2 years to live so may not have been around to see my daughter start school. Her first day was a huge milestone for all of us, and I was grateful that I could be there to share it with her and be at least outwardly "healthy."

We took a two week holiday over Christmas and went down South to catch up with family and friends and enjoyed some Central Otago wine, good food and sunshine. Upon our return I went for another CT and had more bloods taken and this confirmed what we dreaded but expected, and that is that the tumours are once again growing, and my CEA was back up to 140.

Time to take my last treatment option for a spin.

The current plan is to start on Cetuximab (a non-funded targeted drug therapy) on the 26th Jan. It is a weekly treatment and will mean a weekly trip to Palmerston North to have it. We should know within 3 or 4 weeks whether or not it is working, but once again, it is not expected to shrink the tumours, just to hold them steady, once again for an average of 4-5 months.

I will keep you posted......