Saturday, April 11, 2015

Back to Ann Arbor

It's a long way to go for a conversation.  But it was a good conversation to have.  Ann Arbor Cancer Hospital called me and asked that I come down and talk to them about my inclusion of a phase one trial of a new medicine for solid tumors.  The week before, they had requested foundation one testing results from my doctor based on my genomic profile. So Thursday I zipped down to meet with a Dr. Schneider and some of his team.

I like the idea of being part of cutting edge science that is learning how to cure cancer.  I also enjoyed learning about how a drug goes to market.  Dr. Schneider said that this drug was working with my own immune system, "teaching" it to specifically identify cancer genes and attack those cells.  I know from watching "The Emperor of All Maladies" that this is the most promising new horizon for cancer research.  He said I was a good candidate but there were currently no openings and besides, they would not take me off a therapy that was working for one that was experimental.  But people are removed from and added to studies all the time and I should stay in touch and let them know if at any time my current therapy was no longer reducing my tumor.  It is great to have this as a back up!

They left me with a packet explaining in great detail the nature of the study, what could be expected, and everyone's rights and responsibilities.  I learned that this drug was tested with monkeys so this group would be the first human trials.  They saw promising results with the monkey tests and it also helped them with estimating dosing and predicting side effects; primarily raised blood pressure and bleeding in the digestive system in patients with bowel tumors.

It's all a bit anticlimactic and ideally I would not need to resort to a trial for some time.  My next CT scan will be on May 1 and so I will know more a few days after that.

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