Monday, January 25, 2010

Monday Appointment

We had an appointment today with the doctor at Cottage, Dr. Dragovic. When we first arrived we were taken back into an examination room and the nurse took information down from Sean. When Dr.Dragovic came into the room she explained some of the side effects of the WBR (Whole Brain Radiation) to us. Seans oncologist Dr. De Sousa was very dark about WBR which you can read in an earlier post about our visit with her. Dragovic told us that Sean could experience symptoms like that of an aged brain such short term memory loss and so forth. I earlier had read up on WBR so I had a few questions to ask of my own and did when was able. I asked if Sean would have motor skill problems, slurred speech or seizures? Dragovic said that she did not believe Sean would have these problems. She asked if he has experienced seizures in the past and I said no, she said then probably there is nothing to worry about. She also said that unless the tumors were near his speech center slurred speech wasn't a worry. She said she wanted to keep him on the steroid throughout the treatment to discourage swelling which we expected. I also asked why they were choosing to do the WBR instead of the SRS (Stereotactic radiosurgery)(since it appeared at least to me WBR was not a well liked approach to treatment of brain mets) she actually had a few good reasons. One was that the SRS was a high "dose" of radiation and could cause brain necrosis if repeated on the same spots several times. The WBR she said is a lower dose because it is adminstered to the whole brain instead of just portions. She also said that the WBR would also catch any microscopic tumors that they cannot see and prevent them from progressing. They created him a new mask for the treatment while we were there and had him go through a simulation treatment. I mentioned to Dragonvic that De Sousa was also going to have Sean on a chemotherapy pill and antibiotic both which he had not recieved and was wondering if they would have to wait to begin treatment due to it. She said that he was to be on the Chemo during radiation so he had to wait to recieve the medication. I do not know if they will put off his treatment until maybe Wedsenday but I am hoping. Seans 33rd birthday is tommorow and it would really suck to be recieving radiation treatment in my opinion. I will update as I know more.

No comments:

Post a Comment