Prognosis

I had a chance to talk with Dr. Eaton, my Oncologist, about the situation more in-depth this afternoon. The prognosis is better than I anticipated, but still pretty bleak. The cancer has advanced too far to be cured. If we do nothing, they estimate I have approximately 6 to 12 months left to live. He made it very clear though that this is not a very accurate time frame, it's based on other people in my situation, but is in no way an accurate number. It could be less, it could be more, it could even be a lot more. So we are all trying to stay positive and hope for the best.

As far as treatment goes, the only type of treatment they can offer at this point is palliative care. This means that they can take measures to make me comfortable and to enhance the quality of my remaining life, but will not be able to extend my life beyond a few months. The radiation treatment is a good example of this. They are hoping to reduce the size of the tumors on my head so that they do not press against my brain and cause mental difficulties. They may even be able to stop them from growing any further. But this does not guarantee that new tumors won't appear in the future. It also does not stop the cancer from continuing to spread throughout my body. Because most of the tumors are small and spread throughout my liver, lungs and spleen, it would be impossible to treat each one with radiation and would cause extensive, and fatal, damage to the organs. One option that Dr. Eaton is talking to the team about is a chemotherapy treatment that is used in some lung cancer instances. It has the potential to reduce the size of most of the tumors, however, they have limited experience using it for liver cancer and therefore aren't sure if it will be effective at all. They would have to wait until after the radiation therapy is done before they can even begin the chemo, so he will be using that time to discuss the risks vs. benefits with many other doctors before we have to make a decision.