Zero Day plus 57 - Addenbrokes meeting with the consultant

 

 The consultant at today's meeting asked "Did you cycle?" as her first question, seeing my lycra gear. When I confirmed that I had ( about 5 miles over the morning), she was very pleased, seeing this as a good marker of my recovery.

She was happy to say that I had now finished with the effects of the stem-cell transplant chemo and could now go straight into the next (milder) 'Consolidation phase' of chemo straight away, and also restart the bone-strengthening meds that help me avoid fractures. And I can have this chemo locally in Ipswich rather than in Cambridge. There was other good news in that she was quite bullish about my prospects for travel and exercise, so lots of things are nearly back to normal.

However she was also quite honest (my favourite attribute in an oncologist) about my prospects for a full remission, the desirable treatment result where no cancer can be detected for a while (its still there but well-hidden in your bones). She said that because I have a higher-risk genetic factor (TP53 deletion on chromosome 17p is how I believe people in the know refer to it) there is less chance of a full remission. In fact 86% of my cancer cells have this mutation so I may have to settle for a less-complete and shorter remission. Which is not what I want to hear, but sometimes one has to do things one does not want.

However, there is also the possibility of another therapy which will improve my prospects. You'll never guess what it is. It's called a 'tandem transplant'. This doesn't involve making me into a half-man/half-bicycle hybrid. It simply means they use the other half of the stem-cell harvest they took in December and I do another stem- cell transplant in spring, including the Melphalan and side-effects. 

At least I'll know what's going to happen this time and it will be Springtime after all! 🙂