Monday, August 22, 2011

A Plan

Met our radiation oncologist, Dr. Landis. Looks like we will be spending a lot of time in Ballard over the next 3-4 weeks. She is scheduled to start radiation treatment either this Thursday or the following Monday. She will have 15-20 treatments, one each day, M-F, each lasting only about 10-12 minutes. There is some set up time but commute time aside it should only be about thirty minutes in the office. It will be at the same time each day, still unknown what that will be yet.

They are targeting two areas. The tumor in her tailbone and then an entire stretch from her second to lowest rib bone (T-11) to her lower back (L-3). There are twelve identified tumors in the epidural space but they assume it's also in between each one so are bathing that entire segment.

Right now we are waiting for her set up CT scan and positioning session. Based on this they will be able to accurately place her each day so that the Tomo Therapy machine can do its zappage with a high degree of accuracy. It's interesting - we learned the Cyberknife treatment was not appropriate in this case because it's too precise and they need to bathe a segment completely. But this machine is not as crude as the old time external radiation and is able to target a broad enough segment to do the job without hitting vital organs. So side effects are supposed to be minor. Mostly fatigue.

The people at the clinic were great. The doctor looks like he's 22, but really is 39.

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