Cancer Update – May 2012

Today’s visit to see the skin cancer specialist at the hospital turned out to be less positive than I had hoped it would be. The CT scan I had back in March had confirmed the presence of additional nodules in my lungs, some of which had grown in size since my last scan back in October.

So I’m not out the woods yet.

In the world of cancer inside organs, nodules that grow in size are considered to be cancerous due to the fact that benign lumps do not not grow (funny that). Due to the spread and number of nodules (we counted 8 on the scan), they have ruled out surgery as they would basically need to remove both my lungs to get it all. The other option is chemotherapy.

For those of you that don’t know what chemotherapy is, I will let Wikipedia explain it. Basically it just involves taking drugs that kill rapidly multiplying cells in your body – hence why your hair often falls out.

But enough of the bad news, there is some good news. Some clever scientists have discovered that many cancers (including metastatic melanoma) are related to the presence of a protein called B-RAF which caused by a genetic mutation present in many people. 

A new drug called Vemurafenib has been developed which inhibits this protein and has had some very good results against a handful of cancers. This drug is new – it has only been in existence for a few years. It only received FDA approval in the USA in August last year and it is not yet Pharmac-approved in NZ, although it is available in NZ.

The drug is only useful if you have the particular genetic mutation that the drug is set to counteract. If you don’t have the mutation, the drug doesn’t work. Also, as it is not yet government approved, it does not get funded and a monthly dose costs around $15k.

Where’s the good news I hear you ask. Well I have been told that the company that makes the drug has been giving it to certain patients free of charge under ‘compassionate terms’ until it gets government funding. Apparently I fall into this category which I am rather happy about. But even if I am not genetically eligible for the drug (which I will find out in the next few weeks), there are still other chemotherapy drugs available that they can use.

So that’s where things are at for me for now. I will provide updates as things progress with the new course.

Check out my next blog post after this – I’ve posted a video clip of a great song from Jesus Culture which talks about how God takes our negative circumstances and makes something good come of them.

Take care

David