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Good Scan Results at 4 months!

Posted: Fri Jul 13, 2018 11:25 am
by boxhill
Yesterday I got the results of Monday's thoracic/abdominal/pelvic scans with both oral and IV contrast. First time for thoracic, and first time with oral contrast, so I was expecting more detail might turn something up.

Completely clean, with the exception of a single tiny 2mm "indeterminate" lung node. Since it is too small to show up on an x-ray, I may have had it forever, as many people do, and it may be nothing, as most apparently are. Something to keep an eye on for the future, but not to get worried about.

My oncologist and I are very happy to have further insight into the situation, and especially to confirm the somewhat tentative post surgical opinion that there were no known masses. I was bracing for at least some suspicious lymph nodes, given the surgical results, and perhaps some liver irregularities, so I am mightily relieved and my spirits are high! :)

I was also able to have my 5th infusion--no low blood counts this time--and my WBC, which has been hovering just above 2.0, was all the way up to 7.6 after my shot of neulasta last time! That is actually the first time since surgery it has risen into the normal range.

BTW, I attribute this largely to my very thorough and experienced surgeon, who actually specializes in transplants and is not a board certified CRC surgeon, to my knowledge, although he does lots of them.

Re: Good Scan Results at 4 months!

Posted: Fri Jul 13, 2018 12:32 pm
by LPL
Wonderful news :D
Congratulations!

Re: Good Scan Results at 4 months!

Posted: Sat Jul 14, 2018 5:57 pm
by Beckster
Awesome news! :D :D

Re: Good Scan Results at 4 months!

Posted: Mon Jul 16, 2018 9:53 am
by boxhill
Something odd: my CEA was 3 when I had surgery, but they said the tumor didn't express it so it is useless as a marker. This time I happened to get a printout of my full bloodwork results, and noticed that my CEA was 6. I don't know exactly what to make of it, since the cell-death theory of why chemo causes it to rise would not seem to apply here. Or maybe not. Thoughts?

Re: Good Scan Results at 4 months!

Posted: Mon Jul 16, 2018 10:06 am
by DarknessEmbraced
Wonderful news! :D

Re: Good Scan Results at 4 months!

Posted: Mon Jul 16, 2018 12:26 pm
by LPL
boxhill wrote:Something odd: my CEA was 3 when I had surgery, but they said the tumor didn't express it so it is useless as a marker. This time I happened to get a printout of my full bloodwork results, and noticed that my CEA was 6. I don't know exactly what to make of it, since the cell-death theory of why chemo causes it to rise would not seem to apply here. Or maybe not. Thoughts?

I’m sorry I do not understand your signature. It says neg CEA, mut Kras etc.. Can you have a CEA mutation? I’ve never heard about that! My husband has a Kras mutation and it looks like CEA is not such a good cancer marker for him (CA19-9 has reacted though). But I did not know there was a test to see if CEA can be used as a marker or not?!?

Re: Good Scan Results at 4 months!

Posted: Tue Jul 17, 2018 10:34 am
by boxhill
After surgery they told me that my tumor "did not express CEA," so it would not work as a marker for me. That is what I meant by negative for CEA. I gather that this is the case for some percentage of people, perhaps around 30% or so for CRC. I think that the test is a cell staining. BTW, I also have a KRAS mutation. My understanding is that at this point it mostly affects treatment choices, as in EFGR-related therapies probably won't work.

Since then I've looked into it further. Here's an interesting article:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5348349/

Now I wonder whether what they meant was that the cells were CEA lo. I'll have to ask my oncologist about it.

Re: Good Scan Results at 4 months!

Posted: Wed Jul 18, 2018 3:53 pm
by LPL
boxhill wrote:After surgery they told me that my tumor "did not express CEA," so it would not work as a marker for me. That is what I meant by negative for CEA. I gather that this is the case for some percentage of people, perhaps around 30% or so for CRC. I think that the test is a cell staining. BTW, I also have a KRAS mutation. My understanding is that at this point it mostly affects treatment choices, as in EFGR-related therapies probably won't work.

Since then I've looked into it further. Here's an interesting article:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5348349/

Now I wonder whether what they meant was that the cells were CEA lo. I'll have to ask my oncologist about it.

Thank You so much Boxhill for looking in to this! and for that interesting link/research article.
Please share what you will find out after talking to your Onc. Maybe start a new discussion about this because more people will see and maybe they have not heard about this either?!

Re: Good Scan Results at 4 months!

Posted: Thu Jul 19, 2018 10:44 pm
by crikklekay
That’s wonderful news! It’s always good to read of stories like this one especially after reading scary updates from others. I hope your recovery continues to go well!