Dr. Kuhn - The Hands of Christ in Action

Okay, so we waited for over three hours to see Dr. Kuhn today ... and it was worth it. What a wonderful doctor! He is a precious believer who happens to be an incredibly gifted and brilliant surgeon. When we expressed our appreciation for even considering to perform an extremely difficult operation, he said he would use his God given gifts to the best of his ability, and God would take it from there. What a blessing to be in hands so anointed and rare humility of spirit. He gave us new meaning for "being the hands and feet of Christ". Pray for him that he would be abundantly blessed ... and that he would have eyes to see a path through the cancer that others cannot.

The nuts and bolts are that the CT did not show him what he needed, so we wait yet again for the endoscopic ultrasound. He said he hoped have Dr. Millat perform it before Monday. There are two things that need clarification before he will proceed. 1) There appears to be either a clot or cancerous tissue growing in the spleenic vein. If it is a clot, no biggie, we can proceed. If it is cancerous tissue, they need to see if the vein below it is clear. If it is, they can bypass it using a vascular surgeon, but they would need to have one in the operating room at the ready. 2) Ensure that the artery leading from the large intestine to the heart is clear enough to either remove whatever cancer may remain or bypass it also. The last endoscopic ultrasound showed that this vein was cancerous and too close to the upper limit in size for Dr. Kuhn to be comfortable removing. With the amount of shrinkage Dad has experienced, we are hopeful that this will not be a problem. If there is any cancerous tissue they cannot get, they are considering the alcohol ablation (or the other techniques detailed in yesterday's blog).

I Have Good News and Good News (and More Waiting)

Dad had another round of chemotherapy today, had a CT of just his pancreas. We took the disc from the CT to Dr. Kuhn, the surgeon. He told Dr. Nemunaitis that he won't perform surgery until he reviews the CT and has probably has another endoscopic ultrasound of the pancreas to make sure he knows what he's dealing with before he goes in. He is hoping (and we are hopeful) that he can remove it all, but he is extremely thorough. This is good, thorough is very good! If he cannot remove it all, we are hoping for surgical intervention ASAP anyway. What we are praying is that he will remove everything possible and ablate (or burn) the remaining cancer with alcohol, freeze it or radiate it with the "cryo-knife" (oooooh, impressive name-it's really just very directed radiation). We are then on the road to the G-Vax and Genomic Characterization therapies (see earlier post from February). We are meeting with Dr. Kuhn tomorrow at around 10:30 or 11:00 a.m. We had the privilege of talking with David Shanahan, President of Mary Crowley Research Center. He talked at length about the vision of managing the patient's care now, not just gathering numbers for the FDA. Their passion is the patients they are treating, not a singular breakthrough that may, or may not occur. He sees their role as a series of "nudges" that will make a significant impact on the overal treatment for cancer. While it is every researchers dream to have the big breakthrough and find the cure, they don't lose focus on the patients they are treating now. They seek out medical trials that are tailored to their current patient roster and with an eye toward what they need after they complete their current treatment. He is a wonderful man of God, very open with his faith and trusting God to provide for this amazing facility. What a privilege to be in the hands of a group of people who are so full of faith and willing to go way outside the box of traditional treatments when necessary. Pray that God will bless them with finances and His mind to see their way through to a miraculous treatment for this debilitating disease. Dad is feeling good, his spirits are up, and I had to run to keep up with him when we were walking down the halls of Baylor today (all good signs). We'll let you know more tomorrow or Friday.

THE LONG AWAITED.......WAIT!!!!!

Dr. Nemunaitis called Tom at 3:30 p.m. to say that he has talked to Dr. Kuhn about the CT scan. Dr. Kuhn still seems reluctant to do surgery based on his review of the scan because it appears there is still a lot of vein involvement. He (Dr. Kuhn) is reviewing Tom’s case with several colleagues this afternoon and will get back to Dr. Nemunaitis later today with his recommendation. Dr. Nemunaitis has also reviewed Tom’s case with a number of other doctors and received varied recommendations. Several have recommended starting radiation immediately, a couple said absolutely no to radiation. Tom and he discussed our desire to move forward with surgery and moving directly towards the vaccine and genome solution. He is in agreement, if Dr. Kuhn will agree to do the surgery. He said whatever direction we take we should begin no later than Wednesday. He said as soon as he talked to Dr. Kuhn hewould call us back, no later than tomorrow. And so, again, we wait……..