Making a Way in the Wilderness

Leland and I made the trek to Pittsburgh 1.5 weeks ago for my regular appointment, the first since my scan in March showed another 1mm growth on a nodule and my pulmonologist freaked out. First, a resident met with us. (We'd met him once before in the last couple years.) He laid out various scenarios -- wait and see, get radiation done now or in the future -- and then said I could also "wait until symptoms develop." This seemed like an obviously terrible idea. So I said, "Um, by the time I noticed symptoms in Germany, my lungs were full of cancer..." Then he kind of backtracked. He also asked, "So, what do you think you want to do?" as if that little 10-minute talk was sufficient to make a decision. I replied, "Wait to talk to Dr. Villaruz and the radiologist." So that was definitely a less-than-helpful discussion.  When I mentioned the "wait until symptoms develop" comment to Dr. Villaruz she immediately said, we would notice any c...

Dr. Villaruz, my oncologist, called me on Tuesday, March 31 about my blood biopsy results. I have been too busy to post this update until now. I was standing in line to ask the Provost a question during the Faculty Senate plenary when my phone rang (thankfully, it was silenced). When I saw the 412 area code, I knew it was UPMC. There were like 4 people in line ahead of me, so I stepped out to take the call. In sum: There is no evidence of cells with the EGFR mutation, which is what Tagrisso is targeting! So that is great news. There are some other mutations, but apparently there is no way to determine if they come from cancer tumors versus benign sources. (Dr. Villaruz said something about a condition where the body generates mutations that aren’t cancerous. I was not at my computer, so I couldn’t write anything down. I’m still kind of vague on this point.) Since the nodule has grown 3mm since last August (now 13mm), Dr. Villaruz is going to consult with a radiologist about radiation...