Tuesday 14 June 2011

Decision time - part one

The last time this blog was updated our hero was last seen departing into the sunset from St Johns Hospital after spending a couple of nights recovering from a chest infection.

Since that time, many notable things have happened that I should have been blogging about, but just couldn't summon up the will to do so. That time has now come, so here goes.

Picking up the narrative where we left off, I had missed one session of chemo during the time in St Johns. That session was rearranged and carried out as normal. After that a further biopsy was arranged, overnight in the Western General with a general anaesthetic. Again this went smoothly and I came home again to await the results. I was due to have a session of chemo on the day that the Multi Disciplinary Team (MDT) met.

I was prepped for the chemo, just in case, just in case they decided to continue the chemo. Around an hour after we arrived the Consultant arrived and asked for Helen and I (she had come with me that morning). The results of the biopsy showed that the tumour had not responded and in fact they had removed more of the tumour during the biopsy.

It turns out that the response to chemo is also an indicator to the response to radiotherapy. Thus, asI had responded poorly to the chemo, it was likely that I would respond poorly to radiotherapy. We were faced with a decision. Go through the radio therapy, which can be very tiring, with the possibility/probability that is would be ineffective and we would be in the same position again in six months, or do I just go straight for the infinitely less desirable operation to remove my bladder.

part 2 follows here...

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