Ellis Health Update - 170512

At the Tuesday, 25 April visit with the oncologist we reviewed the results of the CAT scan taken last Monday along with the lab tests from the last blood draw (Friday, 21 April).  The blood tests all showed my white cell count to be OK but that I am still anemic as usual.  The doctor didn't seem worried about the anemia, but maybe I will increase my intake of salty potato chips and blackstrap molasses just in case.  The really good news is that the tumor is shrinking and in anticipation of that, based on results of the previous blood tests (the last previous to this Mondays tests), he had added something (he called it bone cement) to fill in the defects left in my rib as the cancer retreats .  Based on these results he recommended continuing the tri-weekly chemo for another nine weeks.  My next office visit and chemo is set for 17 May at 0930.

A  chemo session was originally scheduled to immediately follow the Tuesday, 25 April doctor visit; however, my blood vessels absolutely refused to cooperate.  The nurses successfully inserted needles in five different locations (pretty much without pain, I might add), but my body had apparently learned that they were trying to insert a foreign substance and just refused to accept it. That meant that the installation of a port to facilitate injections would be necessary.  The nurses said that if we could get a port installed the next day at the hospital in Cottonwood and still get to the Oncology Center in Sedona by 1400 they would do the chemo the same day.  That was important to me because I must take a steroid (dexamethasone) twice a day -- the day before, day of, and day following each chemo session.  I get little or no sleep on the days that I take the steroid and by delaying the chemo only one day, I could just continue the steroids for one more day rather than start a new three-day regimen of sleepless nights.

The surgeon at cottonwood saw me late in the day on the 25th (the day for which the chemo session was originally scheduled) and got us scheduled for surgery to install the port (Bard Power Port on right chest with a lead to an artery near the heart) early in the morning of 26 April. When he installed the port he left it ready for chemo and we were in Sedona early enough that the treatment was completed and we were home a little before 1400 on the 26th.

On arrival back home, we were faced with a sprinkler leak where I had apparently damaged the system while planting flowers the day before. That took about 45 minutes and when finished I was feeling spry enough that I finished clipping the already-bloomed irises except for the few alongside the backyard steps/walkway that were still in bloom. The exercise did me good after being confined to hospital beds, wheelchairs, car seats and chemo-treatment chairs for almost eight hours.  The only good part of that confinement was that I knew nothing from the time they wheeled me into surgery until they were ready to take me out again and that I managed to get in a couple of quick naps while undergoing chemo. With the port in place, the chemo went very smoothly.

The few days following the port installation and chemo session, were pretty rough. I had diarrhea for two days and, a severe reaction to the anesthesia used during the surgery to install the port. I did not feel up to resuming my daily walks for several days. After that I recovered nicely and even went for a 3.2-mile walk to Tavasci Marsh with the Skyliners Wednesday walking group on 10 May. I blame most of the problem on an adverse reaction to anesthesia and expect the chemo session scheduled for next week to go smoothly.

Before completing and posting this report, I waited for the doctor's visit report. Arizona Oncology has a website that should make such information available. However the website provides nothing resembling office visit reports. They do complete the reports in a timely fashion and I thought that I had requested that they mail me a copy as soon as it was completed. However, I apparently failed to make clear what I wanted and, after waiting a week, I called to find that they had not understood what I wanted. To make matters even worse, they really did not understand what I was calling about and I had to call again the next week. Finally, after talking directly to the doctor's assistant, I received the report in the mail today, just five days before my next scheduled visit.