Today was also our monthly trip to the Tom Baker Cancer Centre. We received a call yesterday that Bob's appointment could now be moved forward in time. There goes supper out!!!! but an earlier time is always good. The new time was for 12:30. The area around TB is under construction and what has gone missing is the parking lot. This is always a challenge---finding a spot that isn't at COP. Today we drove into the closest lot to TB and like we couldn't believe our eyes there was a spot right near the entrance AND no one else was vying for the spot. We were now early, but were prepared with our reading material and water. We had hardly gotten settled when "Robert Hildebrand" was called. And as only I (Shirley) could say "REALLY'!!!!! complete with a smirk, we were in. Once in the examining room we didn't wait either, tickety boom, the nurse does her thing and Dr. Bahlis is in. Land sakes took my breath away. All done by 12:43. That is some powerful performance.
I wish I knew how to copy the PET scan results and the graphs on here to share but I don't and don't have the patience to figure it out. Soooo you will have to take my word for the results. They are positive.
"The current PET scan examination shows improvement."..."No new hypermetabolic lytic bone lesions have developed elsewhere in the skeleton."...."No hypermetabolic masses or lymphadenopathy are seen anywhere within the body"...."other previously involved skeletal sites remain stable in appearance and inactive."... "There is no evidence of active extra medullary myeloma."
Bob's blood work was good. However the markers for cancer have gone up. The kappa free is 42.5 and the Lambda free at 1.6 making the ratio 26.56 up from 4.8 which is concerning to the doc. In a month if it gets to be 80 or more the chemo will be readjusted and he may be back with chemo drugs that have some of the yukky side affects. However because of the PET results Dr. Bahlis will leave everything as is as far as chemo goes.
The growth on Bob's head was benign.
God is good and the power of prayer is keeping the cancer more or less static. The power of prayer is also keeping Bob active and functioning and living life as well as possible
The pain Bob is having is not because of the cancer. Dr. Bahlis believes that it is the deterioration of the bones. Bob has holes in the pelvis and many weakened bone areas where there were active lesions. This is in the spine, ribs---thorax area. My big prayer now is that he won't fall. The pain meds Bob takes work well but when he needs to take the short acting one to cover more pain, it makes Bob jerky and he is often sleepy and may sleep away most of a day. That is usually after an extra busy day. Our family doctor told us that all of this has aged Bob's body at least 10 years. That puts him at 78.
We are thankful for these results. My small ladies bible study prayed for a miracle and I believe that this is the miracle for now, for this month. Prayer is a powerful tool to strengthen my unbelief.
Psalm 77:14 You are the God who performs miracles; you display your power among the peoples.
