Dr van Rhee to Deb: 'Bottom Line..You are in trouble'

Dr van Rhee to Deb: 'Bottom Line..You are in trouble

With a sober look, Dr van Rhee said those words to us today. He went through all the various treatments and meds Deb has taken and listed potential future treatments. He said Deb had had very hefty treatments yet the cancer remains.

Deb's heart has been weakened and we have a new MUGA heart test next week to determine where it stands.

We had a 10 am appointment and we left the room after 1 pm. A second doctor was with us as well as our APN Kristen.

Although Deb had not wanted to participate in the NK Protocol {Natural Killer Cell} test until more people had been though it, Dr van Rhee said it was Deb's best hope for now. I asked if his wife were sitting in Deb's position would he still recommend it? He said 'absolutely'.

This involves testing our children's blood and selecting the best match. Then that adult child would come to Little Rock for a week. They would take a special physical and then have a Quinton line installed in their neck. Their blood would be circulated through a special machine which would separate out certain cells. Then the blood would be flown to Baylor University Medical School where it would go through a process to multiply the cells. Then a special selection of the NK cells would be done. Meanwhile, Deb would go through a process to destroy her immune system so that when she receives the NK cells, they would become her new immune system. Each cell would kill off about 4 cancer cells. Later, special drug which will stimulate the NK cells to multiply again. Within a week Deb would either be in remission or have had no affect. If no affect, then other experimental treatments could be used.

Dr van Rhee said Deb is 'entering uncharted waters.'

Because Deb's cancer grew during the two weeks at home, we start a new round of chemo starting tomorrow.  We had to order in some Thalomid pills. I do not talk money much, but these 28 pills cost over $8,000! Can you believe it?

So, tomorrow Deb gets a bag with infusion pumps and begins 24/7  infusion of  VRD PACE.
We had to pick up some meds from the UAMS Pharmacy and our angel Pharmacist Carla helped us. Thanks Carla!

This afternoon Deb had an EKG. She will be doing lots of tests in the coming weeks.

So, in summary, Deb's cancer has continued growing. She starts interim chemo tomorrow. Our children's blood is being tested. One of them will give cells to be treated and injected into Deb.

The schedule for all of this has been established.
>An adult child will be here the week of Sept 10th. Child collection will be Sept 13
>Deb will be entered into the NK Program on Sept 17 with a consult and enrollment
>Deb will receive NK cells Oct 4th

Bless us all!