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Eileainn

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Everything posted by Eileainn

  1. The doctor at the local hospital (not Moffitt/Tampa) says as long as he doesn't cough up more blood he can go home tomorrow. Although only a CT scan of his chest was done and not of his back. The doctor felt his back pain is from the Opdivo. I'm concerned of something being overlooked but I'm not a doctor so I don't know. He's suppose to wear a back brace since his surgery, but he doesn't always wear it. The last CT scan that was seen by his oncologist was done on the 6th. According to that, the growth has stabilized. That was also the last time he had an infusion. He has had six infusions so far. He goes back to Moffitt the 21st. And yes he started the Opdivo in November 2016. The hemoptysis started Sunday.
  2. My brother is 51 yrs old, a former long time smoker, and his CT scan last February showed a large mass in his left lung which encapsulates the left bronchus with supraclavicular, mediastinal, and right lung lymphadenopathy. Not long after his voice became weak (the mass was obviously putting pressure on a nerve that ran up to the vocal cord). He was officially diagnosed with either stage IIIb or IV NSCLC (moderately differentiated) in May at Tampa General's cancer center and later in that month after a PET scan confirmed it had spread to his vertebrae and was officially stage IV. He started chemo in July with gemcitabine and carboplatin. While on chemo it had shrunk a little. After a two-month break, a CT scan showed that the mass had grown. In November he had surgery to remove multiple vertebrae and had a cage and screws placed, we were told that the mass was putting pressure on his aorta and if it continued to grow that it could rupture. Also that same month he started Opdivo (nivolumab), as far as I understand he does not have any of the genetic mutations (ALK, EGFR, ROS1, etc.). We decided to transfer to Moffitt. So far on Opdivo, the scans have shown that it is neither growing nor shrinking. A few days ago he started coughing up a couple of tablespoons of fresh blood, numbness in one leg, and his back pain had increased so yesterday his GP wrote a note for him to go to the ER. He's currently in the local hospital. Besides the hemoptysis, numbness in one leg, and increase in back pain, there is nothing else out of the ordinary. His back pain coupled with leg paresthesia indicates to me that there is something going on in the vertebrae, possibly further metastases or perhaps something to do with the surgery. Anyway, anyone have advice? He doesn't want to do chemo again. Although if there is promising chemotherapy out there, I wouldn't be opposed to running it by him. Also, are there any promising immunotherapy drugs in the pipeline for those without mutations?
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