Thursday, October 22, 2009

A Bit of Good News

Today I had the third chemo treatment of my fourth cycle of chemo. Things went pretty well, no reactions to the drugs, but did have a minor problem with my port. Initially the nurse could flush the port but could not draw blood. This is important since every visit they take out several tubes of blood to check hemoglobin levels, white/red blood cells, liver function and the bilirubin, along with dozens of other things - and I have virtually no accessible veins in my arm. If the result of the testing areas named above are too far outside normal ranges, they will not administer the chemo.

At any rate, my wonderful nurse, Carol, who has been GONE for two weeks, printed the test results for me and graphed the tumor marker report. My levels have gone down to 35. The "normal" range is 0-30!

A tumor marker is a substance (protein) that is produced by the body in response to cancer, or is produced by the cancer itself. Some of these markers are specific to one cancer, while others are seen in several types of cancer. These markers are generally used to evaluate the patient's response to treatment or to monitor for recurrence (return of the cancer after treatment). Some markers can help physicians to determine prognosis and treatment.

The CA 27-29 is a tumor marker that is most often used in people with breast cancer. In metastatic cancer, the CA 27-29 level does not ever go down to zero, but it can dip back into the normal range (0-30).

Keep your fingers crossed (and ask whatever deity or god you pray to) that my CT/PT's and MRI's reflect the same results next Wednesday!

Today was a very good day:)

1 comment:

ann mcn said...

Mary,

You are in my prayers, daily. With so many of us praying for you, God's gotta listen!

luv ya!