Thursday, July 22, 2010

July 15, 2010

I had my appointment on July 15, 2010 with doctor who will direct my radiation treatment; everyhting went well and I was impressed by both he and the facility. Radiation will continue for 12 days. The first radiation treatment was today; from start to finish and including aligning the equipment took only 1/2 hr; really no big deal. 11 treatments to go.

I have picked up some new consulting work; drove up to Atlanta on Monday and back on Tuesday (800 miles). Work will continue for another few days.

I feel good right now.

Nothing much else to say.

Saturday, July 10, 2010

July 10, 2010

The appointment for radiation came through quickly. Will be Thursday morining (7/15/2010). H/O and hospital, at least, are quick.

Friday, July 9, 2010

July 9, 2010

Last Wednesday (7/7/2010), I went over to hospital and picked up a CD of my recent CAT-Scan and MRI and took them to another doctor to get a second opinion; he did this and confirmed that the lesions in my vertebra are myeloma. He also called this in my O/H who will be setting up a radiation treatment appointment; hopefully in the next two weeks. I still have no pain and generally feel reasonably good.

The radiologist who rendered the second opinion also suggested that possibly after the radiation treatment is completed, I should consider vertebrolasty (sp?) treatment. This is basically a grout job of the lesions so that they will be less susceptible to fracture. While there is no evidence of fracture so far, I do have several lesions and thus I am susceptible to fractures. The grout job won't cure anything or mitigate existing pain (which I don't have), but will just make the vertebra less susceptible to fracture.

This reminds me of the winter of 1977 when I grouted up a leaking dam in Maine; temperatures were 10-20 degrees below zero; it took 2 months but the leak was plugged.

Today is dex day so I probably won't sleep much tonight.

Monday, July 5, 2010

July 6, 2010

Good news gone bad:

In my last post, I blogged that my recent CAT Scan did not show myeloma; however, this was only the oral report; the actual written report said that was a lesion on my T-9 vertebra suspicious of hemangioma (a build-up of blood vessels and no big deal) or less likely myeloma. A MRI was recommended.

Well the MRI ruled out hemangioma and the lesion probably was a myeloma lesion. The next step probably will be radiation. Hopefully, a course of action will be developed some time this week.

I haven't had any back pain at all; in fact my myeloma has not been characterized by not any pain whatsoever.

I had my 15th Zometa treatment last Tuesday (6/29/2010); CBC's were all in normal range and creatinine was 0.9 (good).

We drove to north Georgia on last Thursday to work on our mountain house; I felt quite good; had lots of energy.