November 5, 2015
A Trip to Mayo in Rochester
The short version of this report is that my PSA is 79, down
from 110 a week ago. The doctors are happy that the number continues to
decrease. In addition the blood analysis shows that all my categories are
normal. This is a good sign. It indicates that my body is responding well to
the chemo treatment. I have had a lump
next to my navel which has been the source of some disagreement. Several
doctors think it is scar tissue from my prostatectomy in 2008; others think it
is a tumor. In order to clarify the situation,
we will return to Mayo on Thursday November 12 so that they can biopsy the lump
on November 13. More on that when the report comes in.
It was a long tiring, satisfactory day at Mayo. We drove
down on Monday November 2, spent all of the 3rd running around the complex and
came home on November 4.
On the 2nd I was checked in for the day at 8:10 am. I had previously sent them a very complete
record of my medical history and had had the various doctors involved in my
cancer treatment send all their reports and all the slides and images that they
had.
At 8:30 I received a
shot of something that made my bones show up for the bone scan. At 10 blood was drawn as reported above. At 10:15 we went to an optional nutrition for
cancer class. We were the only attendees
to the dietitian scrubbed her presentation and we talked about my condition and
what foods I should be taking. We had already moved to the kind of diet they
recommend (basically the Mediterranean diet). We wondered whether any foods
could affect white blood cell count, since one of the dangers during chemo is
that that count goes low and while low the danger of infection-and the
inability to fight infection is lessened. The answer was no, no food affects
white blood cell count. I am low in hemoglobin and calcium so we reviewed foods
that would increase those counts.
At 11:30 I had the bone scan. It lasted 25 minutes. Then the
doctor in attendance wanted a more detailed scan of my pelvic area. After
waiting 25 minutes for the appropriate machine to be available, I had that
round of images, taking about 30 more minutes.
By this time it was past 1, so we went to eat in a
cafeteria. At 2:30 we began the meeting
with the doctors, two of them, a resident who was in oncology this week and an
expert who has been at Mayo for 30 years.
The resident, who I thought at first was the president of the local high
school senior class, went over the blood work, explaining each of the
numbers. As I said all are in the normal
range except calcium and hemoglobin which are just below normal. We asked a
number of questions. She answered what she could and took the others to ask the
expert. One of the key things she told us was that Texotere, the drug they are
using for my chemo, is the gold standard of prostate chemo treatment..
A bit later the expert came, Dr. Quevedo. The first thing he
asked me was whether Riordan was Spanish.
I said it could be because a number of Irishmen had fled to Spain after
the various wars that the Catholics lost to the English.
His main concern was that the tumors have appeared on my
peritoneal wall. This location is highly unusual for metastatic prostate
cancer. As a result, after some explaining and reviewing of images, he
scheduled a biopsy of the lump near my navel.
We will return to Mayo on November 12 and have the requisite blood draw
(at 8) and the biopsy at 10 on November 13.
He wants to rule out that it could be some other cancer causing the
tumors on the peritoneal wall. To arrange the biopsy he called around until he
found a world renowned expert would do it and then he just scheduled me
in. It was pretty amazing considering
the hassle one sometimes goes through to get an appointment with a specialist.
He also addressed the lesion, or tumor, on my iliac crest,
one of the hip bones. The resident had
suggested that they could radiate it, but the expert said no. It’s position on
the bone made that impossible. He praised my oncologist here in Menomonie for
doing a good job with my condition.
Lastly they told me that successful chemo would lengthen my life span by
several years, which was certainly good news.
I have hit the highlights here. The review was thorough. We left at 5:30
feeling very good about the day and our treatment throughout the day. We
planned to drive home that night, but once we were out of the office the
tension of the day caught up with us. It
was all we could do to walk to a nearby restaurant, eat, and come back. I think
I was asleep at 8:30.
For those that live in the Menomonie area, here is a note on
driving to Rochester. We went down on a beautiful day following Hwys 25 and 35
to Wabasha. There we took Hwy 60 to Zumbro Falls and then 63 into
Rochester. Hwy 60 is a fabulous scenic
curvy road. It was fun to drive. That route took us two hours. Coming home we
came back through Plainview and Kellogg, up to Wabasha and on to Menomonie, a
route that took a little over 90 minutes.
It is more rural and less scenic but we moved right along.
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