Things are ramping up and going to get crazy.
Keep us in your prayers that we will remain strong and persevere thru all of this.
On Friday August 13th, we went to Dr. LaWenda's office and met with Olivia and she went over all the test kits. What to do. When to do it. How much to do. I tried to take notes, but it just did not seem to work. Came home so confused.
There are 5. One of them is an all day test. Every hour you have to give up part of your body fluids in one form or another.
An important test is the BRCA1 test kit that will determine if Rick has the ugly deformed gene that causes hormone cancer.
The other tests are to test his body to see what vitamins, minerals and other things he is lacking or supplemental in.
I shall take my own advice, and go....
ONE STEP AT A TIME!
We will git'er done.
Today August 17th we go back to Dr. Foss office and Rick will get a Lupron injection in the buttocks instead of the one in his stomach which really hurt bad. But it was an emergency shot at the time, to stop the production of Testosterone immediately! The Lupron shot will last for 3 months and won't be so painful this time.
Starting Wednesday, August 18th Rick will go for Radiation treatments at 5 PM each day of the week for 10 days. They only last about 15 minutes and I do not project any problems except maybe some fatigue. He is getting his upper arms and thighs radiated.
His bones are quite brittle right now, the doctor said, due to the cancer in the them leaking all the calcium from the bones. He could break a bone very easily and so the radiation will help to put some strength back into them by getting some or most of the cancer out.
Fingers crossed this works because he does not follow doctors orders very well.
Then on August 23rd. this coming Monday he will start Chemo.
Our schedule on Monday is quite busy:
9:45AM arrive for labs
10:45AM: meeting with Dr. Hague
11:15AM: Start the Chemo which will last for 4 hours. Should be done about 4 PM.
Just in time to get to his Radiation appointment at 5 PM.
Initially Dr. Hague said that Chemo would be every three weeks for the next 8 months. I don't know if this has changed since it seems that things are changing weekly at this point.
Dr. Hague said that Rick is strong right now, and he has every confidence that he will be able to tolerate this plan of attack on the cancer.
After this, our days are a mystery. As soon as it sorts itself out though, I will post an update.
Oh and our insurance company sent a notification that they are NOT APPROVING the NUELASTA that Dr. Hague wants to use to help Ricks body regenerate the good cells that the Chemo will kill.
The cost of Nuelasta is $3,000.00 to $7,000.00 per injection.
Side effects of Nuelasta can be quite severe.
Nuelasta would be a ONCE inject per Chemo round.
Other drugs the insurance company does approve of is:
Neupogen, Udenyca, Granix, Fulphila, and Ziextenzo.
These do just about the same thing, yet cost way less, but you do have to take more than one injection.
So maybe the insurance company is doing Rick a favor.
We will see.
2 comments:
You both are in my thoughts and prayers. This is such a stressful and confusing time. Make sure you take some time to care for yourself as well... HUGS.
Sending prayers your way...never ceasing.
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