Working Through Complications

Welcome back to the next Thriving Not Just Surviving blog post. Unfortunately, I am writing this post from a hospital room at Barnes Jewish Hospital in St. Louis. I will use this post to summarize the results of the past few weeks and detail how I was admitted to the hospital.

A few weeks after having my August 3 infusion I began to experience severe headaches and nausea. I initially believed it was a stomach bug. However, after the symptoms did not subside after 4-5 days I reported them to my oncologist. There was much concern surrounding these symptoms as they can be a side effect of the lung cancer cells metastasizing to the brain. Other than traditional brain cancer, lung cancer is the most commonly known cancer to metastasize quickly to the brain. I received a full brain MRI the next day which fortunately came back clean. It would have been rare for the cancer to go to the brain considering that my immune system has eliminated the cancer in most areas of my body. However, the implications for a brain tumor could be devastating to my prognosis so it was beneficial to rule it out.  

Following the brain tumor scare, the headaches improved but the nausea and additional gastrointestinal symptoms developed. My oncologist prescribed several medications to control these symptoms. They worked for a few days and I was able to receive the eighth round of treatment on August 24. Unfortunately, the symptoms returned with increased severity in the following days. As a result, I was admitted to the hospital on Tuesday, August 29. Over the past few days I have been undergoing a variety of tests to determine the source of the symptoms. To-date, all the tests have returned negative results. I have been under observation to ensure that the symptoms do not cause extreme weight loss or dehydration.

I am scheduled to undergo a full colonoscopy on Tuesday afternoon. This should be the last test and the findings or lack of findings will determine our new approach. The new approach could be as simple as  using antibiotics to treat an infection that has embedded itself in my digestive system. Or it could be discontinuing Keytruda altogether and developing a completely new treatment plan. It’s impossible to predict the outcome at this point.

Despite these complications, the doctors are fairly certain that these symptoms are not from the cancer spreading in any way. To the best of everyone’s knowledge, I still have only 1 small tumor remaining in my right lung.

Maureen and I continue to appreciate the prayers and support as we have experienced a lot of uncertainty the past few weeks. In the beginning, I knew that there would be times like this in which complications would arise. It is my hope that we are on the verge of obtaining clarity and an updated path to move forward.